Unintended Emotional Crimes
by Annie789
Summary: Pretending to be Lily’s boyfriend for the summer would have been a lot easier if Remus didn’t secretly wish it was more than pretend. Canon-compatible RL/LE; features Remus, Lily, James, Sirius, Peter, and Snape, with cameos by the Blacks
1. Chapter 1

Title: Unintended Emotional Crimes  
Rating: PG

Summary: Pretending to be Lily's boyfriend for the summer would have been a lot easier if Remus didn't secretly wish it was more than pretend. (Canon-compatible R/L; features Remus, Lily, James, Sirius, Peter, and Snape with cameos by the Blacks)

_Disclaimer: I don't own anything. I wrote this completely for my own amusement and out of love for the series._

**Part One:**_ In which Lily asks Remus for a favor, and Remus asks Peter to keep a secret._

"I need you to be my boyfriend."

Remus Lupin choked on the sandwich he'd bitten into. Dropping it to his plate, he started to cough as he grabbed for his water glass. He gulped at the water, the shock of the statement settling into his brain. Those just weren't words anyone would expect to hear when meeting a friend to catch up over lunch, and they especially weren't words he ever thought would be directed at _him_. After several more gulps of water, he lowered the glass and stared across the table at the redhead who was staring back at him. There was only one good reason to explain what had just been said - clearly, he had heard something wrong. "What?"

She took a deep breath. "I need you to be my boyfriend," she repeated.

Damn. She really had said that, and the look on her face suggested she wasn't just teasing him or playing some silly prank. No, Lily wasn't into pranks. But she couldn't be serious. Although…she could be under some sort of hex or maybe someone slipped her a – he swallowed – love potion. Remus glanced around the outdoor café, looking for anything out of the ordinary. Around them, muggles continued their meals, laughing and sharing stories. There wasn't anything to suggest this was some elaborate joke – or worse, test of friendship – that was being directed towards him. As it was, he was pretty sure that no one even knew he was meeting Lily in London today except for his parents and her sister…which meant she had to be serious.

Slowly, Remus turned back to Lily. He never would have pictured her as someone who would fancy him. Lily was smart and beautiful and funny…she could have any guy she wanted and was more suited to be on the arm of a Sirius Black type than someone ordinary and boring like himself. Why, he wondered, did the one pretty, smart, funny, perfect girl who fancied him have to be off limits? Hell, why did the _only_ girl to fancy him have to be off limits? He sighed. This was definitely a situation he never imagined he'd be in and he had no idea how to proceed. "Uh, Lily, you know, I'm very flattered," he started, "But, well, you know I'm best friends with James, right?"

Her eyes widened. "Oh! Oh, no, Remus, I didn't mean…I wouldn't ask you to…" she sighed. "I'm not very good at this sort of thing."

He wasn't sure what sort of thing she was talking about. If it was asking someone out, he had a feeling that no one was very good at it, except, perhaps Sirius, and that was only because he had more confidence than anyone their age should rightfully possess.

"I don't want to put you in any awkward situation with James Potter," Lily continued. "And I know that you aren't interested in me that way, I just…I was hoping you'd help me out this summer by _pretending_ to be my boyfriend." The words poured out of her mouth rapidly.

Something inside of him knotted up. Well, at least that made sense. Girls like Lily Evans never actually looked at guys like him. But a pretend boyfriend – he supposed he was meant to be the nice, decent bloke who her parents would approve of while she ran off with some handsome bad-boy behind their backs. A bitter feeling rose in his throat and he thought about telling her to shove off. Instead, he managed to get out the word, "Why?"

"Sev. You know what happened at the end of term."

Remus blinked. That wasn't exactly where he'd pictured this conversation going. He'd known Lily was friends with Severus Snape. She'd often talked about him when they were in the midst of their prefect duties. He'd just assumed that they were _only_ friends. "I didn't realize that you two were, err…"

Lily gave him a confused look, then understanding dawned. "We never were and we certainly aren't now." She shook her head, sounding nearly as bitter as he felt. "We used to be best friends. But I just, I can't keep being his friend. Not after…well, you know. I've asked him to stay away from me, but…he keeps trying to apologize."

He wasn't sure what Severus Snape's insults had to do with Lily needing a boyfriend, but friends who let other friends down in very bad ways – that was a topic he knew all too well. While he wasn't exactly fond of Snape, he wasn't quite sure how one horrible word could end what was clearly years of friendship. "Sometimes," Remus tried to be sympathetic, "Friends do really horrible things without thinking." Like involve you in the type of practical joke that could put you in Azkaban for murder.

She shook her head again. "I'm done, Remus. I can't do it anymore. You can only try to help someone so long before giving up." She sighed, looking down at her food. Lily picked at her fries for a few minutes before looking up at him again. "Sev and I always spent the summers together since we live near each other, and ever since school's let out he's tried to come over and talk to me a couple of times…I just think he'll leave me alone if I have a boyfriend hanging around. He's always been really odd about the topic in the past. Last year, when I came back from vacation with my family after a short lived summer romance, he flat out told me that he wouldn't want to be around me if I was involved with someone. He was so mean about it…."

Because Snape liked her. If he had ten galleons to bet, he'd put money on it. Remus shook his head. "You know, you could always ask James to be your fake boyfriend."

"No, I can't," she said firmly. "I can't be in the same room as James without wanting to hex him into the next century. No one would ever believe we'd get together. But you and me, we've been friends for a long time and you haven't mentioned a girlfriend so I thought…just for the summer…we can make a big show of breaking up when we get back to school, and if you want, you can tell James it's all fake if he promises not to tell Sev. Please. You really only would have to hang out with me a couple of times, just put on a show..." her green eyes pleaded with him.

While this wasn't the craziest idea he'd ever heard – Sirius and James were constantly competing for that honor – he wasn't quite sure it would work. In fact, he was pretty sure it wouldn't work. Not to mention that Snape could ruin his life if he chose to do so. And how would James react? Probably not well, even if it was only pretend. He opened his mouth to tell Lily she'd just have to find someone else.

She beat him. "Please, Remus, you're the only friend I can trust to help me with this."

He knew in that moment he couldn't say 'no.'

~*~

Knowing you did something stupid and knowing you cannot possibly fix it are two of the worst bits of knowledge in the world. Keeping that knowledge locked up in your head could easily lead to a mental break down, which is why Remus Lupin found himself banging on the front door of his best friend's house thirty minutes after leaving lunch with Lily Evans.

Peter's mum finally answered the door after two minutes of constant pounding. She looked at him over the top of the reading glasses perched on her nose, an expression of resignation on her face. "Hello, Remus."

"Hi, Mrs. Pettigrew," he dropped his hand to his side and watched as she glanced around the front yard behind him, no doubt looking for James and Sirius. He didn't blame her; the last time the four of them were in the front yard, James had 'accidentally' destroyed her immaculately kept flower gardens. Remus shifted his weight, feeling somewhat guilty for his involvement in the flower incident. "Is Peter home?"

"He's upstairs." She continued to scour the yard, suspicious. As he stepped past her, she asked, "Uh, Remus, dear, are your friends with you today?"

"No." And, he'd decided on his way over, they were never going to know about this. "Just me. James is in Godric's Hollow with his parents, and Sirius…" actually, he had no idea where Sirius was. Probably raising hell amongst his relatives. "Sirius isn't here either," he finished lamely.

Mrs. Pettigrew shut the door behind him and gave him an appraising look. Whatever doubts she had as to whether he was alone must have disappeared, as she leaned over the railing. "Peter?! One of your little friends is here!" With a forced smile, she turned back to him. "You can go ahead on up."

Peter met him at the top of the stairs. "I cannot believe she still calls you guys my little friends." He made a face. "She makes it sound like we're five."

"Well, we have a tendency to act that way," Remus replied. "Look, Pete, are you busy? I have a problem and I know I should have owled first, but…" he sighed. "This is an emergency."

Peter's eyes widened. "What kind of an emergency?"

The kind that most likely would end with someone knocking his block off. Remus winced. "It involves a girl."

He hadn't thought Peter's eyes could get wider, but they did. His friend grabbed his arm, pulled him into the room, and shut the door. "What happened?"

"I just did something really stupid," Remus announced, falling into one of Peter's bright green bean bag chairs. He rubbed his hands over his face, trying to figure out how, exactly, he'd gotten himself into this and whether his friend would think him a backstabbing traitor when he confessed to what he'd done.

"You didn't let Sirius talk you into pursuing Narcissa Black, did you?" Peter asked as he fell onto the other bean bag chair.

Remus gave him the dirtiest look he could muster. One remark when he was trying to comfort Sirius about his messed-up family, and now they were all convinced he was secretly carrying a torch for Narcissa, despite the fact that she was both too old and too crazy for him. "That's not funny," he growled, "And I do not have a thing for Sirius's cousin." Remus straightened in his chair. "Peter, if I tell you something, can you promise me you won't tell James and Sirius?"

That got his attention. Peter froze and stared at him. Finally, he found his voice. "Why not?"

"Because it's also about Snape, and James won't keep it secret from Sirius and Sirius can't keep his big mouth shut when it comes to Snape," Remus told him. He'd found it was easier to have two lists of secrets, one that was "Sirius Approved," i.e. couldn't come back to destroy his life if it got out, and one that was not. Being Lily Evans's boyfriend, albeit a fake one, definitely fell on the "not" list. Actually, these days, most secrets fell on the "not" list.

Peter looked uncomfortable with this declaration. "Sirius can keep a secret…."

"Sure he can. 'Hey, Snape, if you want to know where Remus goes every month, all you have to do is get a really long stick….'" Remus slouched down on his chair, scowled, and crossed his arms.

The desire to know the secret fought against the desire not to hide something from his friends on Peter's face. Knowing the secret won. "Okay, I promise," he agreed.

"I'm serious, Pete. This is a world-ending secret," Remus prompted.

"I am, too." Peter held up his right hand. "I solemnly swear I will not breathe a word of what you tell me to anyone."

Right. Remus felt himself relax a bit. Pete would keep his word. Out of his three friends, Peter was the best at that. He chose a spot on the floor to stare at, took a deep breath, and told the whole story, from meeting Lily and her sister, to going to lunch with Lily while the sister secretly met up with her boyfriend, to Lily's predicament and suggested solution, to his agreement. He didn't leave anything out, and felt worse and worse as he talked. "And then we met back up with her sister at the car – it's a muggle machine used for travel – and they left." Remus finally looked up and over at Peter.

He'd expected to see shock at this blatant betrayal of James's trust. Instead, Peter's face was both impressed and amused. "You get to date Lily Evans?"

"It's _pretend_." He tried to stress the 'pretend' bit as much as possible. "I would never really date her. James likes her."

"Do _you_ like her?" Peter asked.

"No," Remus insisted. The lie came out easier than he thought. "Of course not. And even if I did, I wouldn't pursue her because _James likes her_." He paused. "I need to tell James, don't I?"

Peter frowned. "I thought you didn't want Sirius to know."

"I don't."

"You can't tell James, then. He'll tell Sirius, even if you ask him not to, and you know the first chance Sirius has, he'll go up to Snape and say something like, 'hey, Snivellus, you're so pathetic, Lily Evans had to pretend to go out with my friend Remus over there just so you'd stay away from her.'" Peter told him.

And Peter was right. Remus could see the conversation clearly in his mind. "But I couldn't say no to Lily," he rationalized. "And I did already tell her I would do it."

"Course you can't say no," Peter agreed. "She's been a good friend to you."

"And it _is_ just pretend and just for the summer. I can tell James the whole story once we're back at school and it's all over. He'll understand." The rationalization was coming easier. Of course James would understand. It was all just a big prank on Snape, wasn't it? They'd get a laugh about it in the dorm and everything would be fine.

"Yeah, he's always been really understanding," Peter continued to agree with him.

"This is going to be okay," Remus decided. "I can help Lily and it won't bother James." A feeling of relief settled over him and he relaxed. "Thanks, Pete." Everything would be okay; as long as the little charade ended before James found out about it and got the wrong idea, it would all work out. He smiled and stretched, the weight lifted. "Hey, Pete? You mum wouldn't happen to have made those cookies with the chocolate chips again, would she?"


	2. Chapter 2

**Part Two:**_ In which Remus's mail is scrutinized and Sirius's family creates issues._

"Who is Lily?"

Remus looked up from his breakfast as his mother entered the kitchen, a stack of letters in her hands. He felt his face redden as she set two letters in front of his plate. "Er…."

His mum beamed at this reaction. As she did, warnings were triggered in his mind. Clearly, one of those letters was from Lily, and, as Lily was a girl's name and this girl was writing to _him_, his mother probably thought that Lily was his girlfriend.

Which she was. Sort of. For pretend.

"Lily is one of the other prefects from school," Remus offered, picking up the letters. The first was addressed to him with Lily's name and address clearly printed in the place for return post. The second was in Sirius's scratchy handwriting. Sirius's letter was probably the traditional Sirius-Black-first-letter-of-the-summer mixture of requests for sympathy - detailing how his mother was evil (which she was) and his family was crazy (most of them were) – and taunts about Remus's alleged crush on Narcissa (which did not exist anywhere outside of Sirius's imagination). A letter teasing him about a non-existent crush or a letter from a girl who trusted him enough to ask a large and embarrassing favor of him? The choice was amazingly simple. He slid Sirius's letter under Lily's and opened the top envelope. Feeling someone watching him, he looked up.

His mother hovered over his right shoulder.

Remus shut the envelope and glared at her, scowling. "Mum, do you mind?"

"Sorry," she remarked, looking not the least bit sorry as moved towards the sink. In a hopeful voice, she asked, "So are you and Lily friends?"

"Mum!" He felt himself turning red. "Lily's just a girl in my house. She probably wants to go over some logistics and rules and stuff before we go back. We just work together."

"Of course you do." Her voice took on a tone that sounded as if she were humoring a five-year-old child in the middle of a temper tantrum.

"Mum, really, Lily Evans does not have the slightest romantic inclination towards me." He wanted to add that girls like Lily Evans didn't look at thin, pale boys that turned into monsters once a month, but held his tongue. There were certain things he had to avoid saying around his mother. First and foremost was talk, no matter how realistic, about the things he would never do because of his condition, like get a decent job or get married and have a family. It still surprised him sometimes that, while he'd come to terms with the fact that this was what life had given him, his mother had not. Remus was certain she held out some secret hope that either someone would develop a cure for lycanthropy or that people would change their ways and accept him for who he was. His mother could delude herself if it helped her cope; he wasn't going to hold his breath.

"You know, Remus, your father and I were friends before we fell in love."

He dropped his head to the table. "Dad? Help?"

"Son, I think you protest too much," his father remarked dryly from behind the _Prophet_. He folded the paper, set it aside, and fixed Remus with the measuring look usually reserved for moments when he'd done something he shouldn't have and was about to get a lecture. He watched as his father opened his mouth, glanced at his mother out of the corner of his eye, shut it, and apparently changed his mind, picking up the paper and disappearing behind it once again.

Well, this was awkward. Trying to ignore his parents' strange reactions to his getting mail from a girl, Remus pulled Lily's letter from the envelope and picked up a piece of toast with his spare hand. Taking a bite, he read how much Lily enjoyed their lunch, prompting another blush that he tried and failed to hide by ducking lower behind the parchment. She didn't have to play the part of love-struck girlfriend in their private correspondence; it wasn't like he was going to show her letters to anyone. The next few paragraphs talked briefly of her family and how she'd spent the three days since they'd last seen each other, then concluded with an invitation to spend Saturday with her.

His stomach flipped and he dropped his toast. Trying to cover the reaction, he reached for his juice and made a show of taking a long drink. He'd known the invitation was coming – he wouldn't be able to pretend to be Lily's boyfriend from London if Snape was in her hometown – but now that it _had_, he wasn't prepared for the painful emotions. Fake or not, this still felt a bit like he was doing something he shouldn't behind James's back. James, who had been one of the only people _ever_ to not care what he was, who had broken more laws than Remus could count to try to make full moons just a little less painful, who was the only reason he wasn't sitting locked up in a cell in Azkaban right now…and all James asked in return was friendship. Friends didn't have romantic trysts with the girl their friend was in love with. Maybe he should tell James and risk Sirius opening his big mouth…

Remus looked up from his letter. "Uh, Dad? Can I, uh, talk to you for a minute?" He glanced over at his mother, still washing the breakfast dishes, and added, "In private?"

His father lowered the paper, took one look at his face, and frowned. "Of course. Is there something wrong?"

"In private?" Remus repeated. He couldn't have this conversation within earshot of his mother. It would most likely deal with her two least favorite topics – that he was a werewolf and that werewolves shouldn't do things normal people did - and would just make her cry again. He was tired of being the reason his mum cried.

"We'll be right back," his father told his mother, rising from his chair and heading towards the living room.

Remus tucked Lily's letter in his back pocket and followed, shutting the door between their kitchen and tiny living room behind him. How to even start? With a sigh, he started walking across the room, wracking his brain for the right words to explain his predicament. "I met Lily a few days ago for lunch, and she told me – well, it's complicated – and she wants me to go visit her this weekend…."

"Son, why don't we try this sitting down and without the pacing?" His father gave him an amused smile, waving at the sofa.

He obeyed, sinking onto the couch. He took a breath as if to speak, lost the words, and shut his mouth again. The coffee table suddenly became the most interesting thing in the room. "Dad, this is – I'm in so much trouble…" Remus buried his head into his hands.

His father cleared his throat and his voice took on a dark tone. "Remus, I'm having a bit of trouble following you right now. Uh, I don't mean to embarrass or pry, but…you didn't get this girl in any trouble did you?"

His head shot up. "No!" He shook his head emphatically, "Lily and I aren't…I haven't even kissed her!" He felt like he was going to be ill. "A couple of hugs, that's it. And they were platonic hugs."

He watched his father let out a long breath. "I just had to be sure. When we came in here, I thought you might be wrestling with asking this girl out, but then you said she told you something and now you were in trouble…forgive me if my imagination went somewhere dark for a moment."

Remus heard himself let out a deep sigh as well. "It's okay. I guess it did sound…bad." He shook his head. After a few minutes of silence, he finally offered, "James likes her."

"Ah. And this Lily has decided she'd rather spend the summer with you?" His father smiled again, though it was hard to tell whether it was at relief that his son just had the same problems as other normal teenage boys or at the actual situation.

"Something like that," Remus muttered.

"And you want to spend the summer with Lily?" His father continued.

"I told her I would," he admitted, feeling guilty again. He returned his gaze to the coffee table.

"Well, son, I think you need to decide which…" A knock on the door interrupted his father. "Come in."

Remus's mother stuck her head into the room. "I don't mean to interrupt, but Peter is here."

Remus frowned, rising from his seat. Peter usually didn't bother getting out of bed before noon in the summer. If he was here at nine o'clock in the morning, something really bad had happened. Visions of James, with Peter and Sirius in tow, storming across England ready to kill him for his arrangement with Lily filled his mind. Remus vaguely wondered if Lily had told James about the fake relationship in a well-meaning attempt to ensure James wouldn't believe they were actually running around together behind his back, and was somewhat amazed at how quickly everything had exploded into pandemonium.

His questions didn't have long to wait as Peter appeared around his mother, out of breath. Without offering any polite greetings, he blurted out, "Remus, have you read your letter from Sirius yet?"

The letter in question was still unopened beside his plate in the kitchen. "No." Remus felt his brows knit together and asked a rather stupid question. "Is something wrong?"

Peter nodded, his face growing paler. "Sirius's mum kicked him out!"

~*~

"So she said that if I left, I couldn't come back, and I told her that was fine with me and walked out," Sirius finished, his voice sounding oddly calm.

Silence descended upon their small group as they sat under the large oak tree in James's backyard, staring up at their friend. His story complete, Sirius set his mouth in a thin, stubborn line and joined them, taking a seat on one of the Potters' carved stone benches.

Remus looked at Peter, unsure of what to say. 'I'm sorry your Mum is evil and you have no home' just didn't seem to be appropriate, but he had no idea what _was_. He rubbed at his temples, leaning against the tree trunk, and glanced over at James, who shot him an apologetic look. Clearly, none of them knew how to reply to their friend and all felt guilty to only be capable of listening.

"She probably didn't mean it, Padfoot," Peter spoke up, trying to be comforting. "She was probably just angry, but after she calms down…"

"Nah, she meant it," Sirius interrupted him. "She tossed my school trunk out the front door and Regulus," he made a disgusted face, "Already took the liberty of sending me a howler, letting me know that my name's been blasted off the family tree and that a blood-traitor like me is no part of their perfect little pure-blood family." His voice took on a bitter tone as he spoke, and he became very interested in scuffing his shoes in the dirt.

Remus just stared at Sirius. He couldn't fathom a mother hating her own child so much as to kick him out of her family. Sirius had no place to go, not a cent to his name, and his only possessions were now the old school books and uniforms stuffed in his Hogwarts trunk. How could Mrs. Black be that, that…he struggled to find a good word to describe her and failed. For the first time, he started to wonder if he'd been wrong in assuming that Sirius had exaggerated all the stories he'd told about the Blacks these past five years.

"Where will you live?" Peter asked Sirius, his concern evident on his face.

"Mum and Dad said he can live with us," James said. He climbed to his feet and moved to sit next to Sirius, slapping his best friend lightly on his back. "We've got more room than we know what to do with and he practically spends the summer here every year anyway. Might as well make it official."

Sirius gave James a thin smile before going back to scuffing his shoes.

"And we're both going to get jobs," James continued. "Mum says I need to learn some responsibility, anyway, so it's as good a way as any to do that. We figure if we save up all our paychecks, we can buy one of those Muggle motor-somethings by the end of next summer."

"Motorcycles," Sirius remarked, looking a little less gloomy. "Prongs, I can save up for the thing myself someday. You don't have to give me money towards it, and besides, there are more important things I need to buy in the meantime, like," he made a face, "Textbooks." Sirius pointed at Remus and grinned, "No comments about my lack of study habits, Moony." The grin disappeared as he turned back to James. "And I will pay your parents back for letting me live here. I'm not quite sure _how_ yet, but I will."

"You don't have to," James replied with a shrug. "I mean, Mum and Dad are glad to put you up. They believe you're a large part of the reason I haven't gotten myself expelled from Hogwarts yet and consider this a way to repay you."

"If only they knew the truth," Peter commented, his voice taking on a helpful tone as he tried to make a joke.

Sirius looked at him strangely for a moment, then threw his head back and laughed. "Exactly."

James's mum chose that moment to open the back door and call out that she was leaving a pitcher of lemonade on the table if they wanted any. James hollered back that they were fine and they'd be inside in a bit before turning back to the group. He glanced over at Remus and frowned. "You okay, Moony? You've been awful quiet."

Remus froze. He hadn't even been thinking of the big secret he'd been hiding – Sirius getting disowned had made him completely forget about Lily Evans for several hours – but suddenly, it reared its ugly head and he felt extremely uncomfortable.

"Well," Peter jumped to his aid, "He probably isn't feeling very well. It _is_ full moon tonight, and his mum and dad gave us a big lecture about getting back in time before we Flooed over here."

Sirius's eyes lit up. "Yeah, it is full moon tonight, isn't it?" He jumped to his feet, suddenly excited. "You two should stay here and we can spend the night the way we always do!"

"No!" Remus sat up quickly.

"Why not?" Sirius asked, looking disgruntled at the response.

"Because I might…." Realizing he was speaking loudly, he lowered his voice, "This is a town full of people and what happens if I bite one of them?"

"Moony," Sirius gave him a skeptical look, "We run around the grounds of Hogwarts every full moon, and, in case you missed it, that's a school full of children. You've never bit any of them."

Remus glared at him. "I'm not going to risk it."

"Prongs and I will be right there to keep you in line like always," Sirius continued, almost pleading now. "Nothing is going to go wrong. Nothing ever goes wrong."

But there had been several times when things had almost gone wrong. While they'd had a good laugh about those misadventures in the daytime, it didn't quite change the fact that there had been a couple of nights when he'd come close to doing something horrible.

"Wormtail said Moony's parents are insisting he come home tonight, and I doubt they know about our little arrangement," James jumped to his defense. "It'll be suspicious if Moony doesn't show up at home with plenty of time to spare."

"I doubt they'd have let me come out here today if it wasn't an emergency," Remus added. "But Wormtail can stay and the three of you can have full moon without me."

"But it won't be the same," Sirius said. He sighed, returning to his seat on the bench. "I suppose you're right, though. We'd get in a lot of trouble if anyone became suspicious of how we spend full moon at school."

"Right. So that's settled," James stood up and brushed the dirt off his pants before running a hand through his hair to mess it up. "Moony and Wormtail go back to London before dinner. I move Padfoot into one of our multitude of spare rooms and we start looking for jobs to get that motorcycle. Gentlemen, I do believe we have a plan." He clapped his hands together and looked around the group, a mischievous gleam in his eyes. "All this planning makes me thirsty. Who thinks we should swipe some firewhisky from the liquor cabinet and add it to that lemonade Mum made us?"


	3. Chapter 3

**Part Three:**_ In which Lily flirts, Snape leers, and Remus makes a plan_

He should have forgone Ancient Runes and taken Muggle Studies. Perhaps then he'd have had some idea as to what he should expect from the 'funfair' Lily had taken him to. Around them, muggles participated in strange sporting events – like throwing point-tipped barbs at balloons and tossing balls at empty milk jugs – or sampled exotic cuisine with odd names like 'corn dogs.'

"When you invited me up here, I assumed we would go to the park and work on Slughorn's summer reading," Remus commented, watching a small muggle girl carrying a lollipop that was easily the size of her head as she skipped past them.

Lily interlaced her fingers with his. "I thought this would be more fun." She leaned closer as if telling him a dark secret. "Besides, I know you have a sweet tooth and this place is full of every type of confectionary you can imagine." Her breath felt warm against the side of his face.

Remus shut his eyes. He'd promised himself he would not become emotionally involved. Somehow, he knew if he never felt anything towards Lily, if he saw her as just another student from school, he wouldn't be betraying James. All he had to do was remain calm, collected, and detached, no matter what happened.

Of course, this would have been a lot easier if Lily was wearing her long, black, shapeless Hogwarts robes instead of that green sundress. He'd already spent far too much time admiring her in it and she had to have noticed. It also would have been simpler if she didn't keep doing little things to get to him, like the way she'd lean into him to flirt, or the way she'd linger when she brushed against him. He knew she was just playing a part, but she played it so well that it was going to drive him mad.

He opened his eyes and tried desperately to remember what she'd just said. Something about the funfair having confectionaries. He needed a response. A response. _Come on, Lupin, you're one of the top students in your class; you should be able to come up with something that sounds intelligent…._ "Except chocolate frogs," he told her, mock serious. "I don't know if I can go someplace that doesn't have chocolate frogs. We may be forced to study until this problem is corrected."

Lily giggled. "Thwarted by a lack of chocolate frogs." She nudged him playfully. "Remus Lupin, if I didn't know any better, I'd think you _wanted_ to spend all your time surrounded by books."

"If you didn't know any better?" He asked as he tried to ignore the heady feeling that had been afflicting him all day. It was still too close to the full moon. He should have waited until he'd recovered more. Yes, that's all it was.

"Oh, come now. I know you run around with Black and Potter, and I don't think I've ever seen either of them open a book." Lily looked up at him, her eyes smiling. "I'm not quite sure what you four get up to, but I know it isn't cataloguing where the best tomes on transfiguration are in the library."

He smiled. Actually, James, Peter, and Sirius had done just that on more than one occasion. "You probably don't want to know." He paused beside a make-shift building displaying paintings of what he could only imagine to be the muggle idea of a ghost. How odd. The ghosts didn't look like people at all, but more the way Sirius did the time he'd tossed a sheet over his head while reenacting something James had done with the invisibility cloak.

"It's a ghost train." Lily explained as she stopped beside him. "You know, a ride with things like ghosts and witches and werewolves. Muggles have these outdated ideas about horror stories and this is how they're manifested. It's supposed to be scary." She tilted her head to the side. "I suppose it's a bit insulting. I mean, according to the ride, I'm supposed to have a hooked nose and a face full of warts, and my life's ambition would be to eat little children."

Remus stared at her in disbelief. "Muggles really believe that?" He actually was a monster, and his life's ambition was to graduate and get a job that would pay him enough to make rent. To think that muggles would believe those things about someone like Lily seemed absurd.

"Adults don't seriously believe it, and children don't know any better." The witch in question didn't seem to be bothered by the ride as she tugged on his hand, leading him away from the ghost train. "Come on, Remus. There's something you need to try and I've been dying to see your face when you do." She pulled him around the corner of a large tent and froze.

He didn't stop nearly as fast as she had and practically slammed into Lily's back. He felt her stumble and dropped her hand to catch her around the waist, before looking to see what had caused her to stop.

Severus Snape stood a few feet in front of them, his mouth open in disbelief. For a few moments, he gaped at them, his jaw moving but no words coming out. Snape finally managed to shut his mouth while his face took on a variety of expressions ranging from concern to an anger-hatred mixture; the former was directed exclusively towards Lily and the latter, Remus noted, was reserved especially for him.

"Hello, Severus." Lily spoke first, her voice colder than Remus had ever heard it. He felt her tense in his arms and wondered briefly whether there really had been nothing between Lily and Snape.

Snape's dark eyes continued to dart between Lily and Remus before he blurted, "What is _he_ doing here?"

That was his cue. It was time to make his acting debut in the exciting and much coveted role of Lily Evans's Boyfriend. Remus removed his arms from Lily and stepped forward to stand beside her. "Lily invited me to the funfair."

Snape turned to her. "You invited one of _them_? To this?" While the other boy tried to throw venom into his voice, Remus couldn't miss the pain underlying it. He wondered if today's festivities were on Lily and Snape's list of annual summer activities. Judging by the little he'd seen of the town, the funfair was probably the highlight of the year. Snape had almost certainly been hanging around the brightly colored stands and muggle amusements all day, hoping to 'accidentally' run into Lily. Remus instantly felt a twinge of guilt; Lily's actions were meant to hurt Snape and they most certainly succeeded.

Lily's hand slid into his and he felt her trembling. Despite whatever she was feeling, she managed to merely sound annoyed. "I invited _Remus_, not Potter and Black."

Snape sneered. "I always thought it was Potter that fancied you. I wonder, does he know one of his best mates is here with you?" When neither of them responded, he glanced at Remus and continued, "Of course not. Although it's hardly shocking that something like Lupin isn't loyal to his friends. He'd probably just as soon kill his best friend if he happened to cross his path at the wrong time."

Remus felt himself go cold. The blood began to drain from his face and his breathing became shallow as his eyes met Snape's. Calling him out on what he was doing to James was one thing. Revealing what he _was_ was something else entirely. Promise to Dumbledore or no, Remus doubted there was anything to keep Snape from announcing the truth to Lily and anyone else who would listen now that they were far away from Hogwarts. _Please don't, please don't, please don't…_ He felt himself mouth the word 'please.'

The other boy gave him a wicked grin.

"So now you've got a problem with half-bloods, too?" Lily asked angrily, oblivious to Snape's not-so-veiled implications. "You do remember that you're a half-blood, don't you?"

"You know my distaste for Lupin has nothing to do with his blood status," Snape snapped. Their voices were sounding further and further away.

"I'm not listening to this," Lily informed him. "We're leaving now. Good-bye, Severus."

Remus felt her pull on his hand and was vaguely aware that she was leading him around Snape and down the aisle of brightly colored tents. His heart was still beating loudly, the blood rushing through his ears, and thinking on his own was impossible at the moment. That he was able to stay on his feet was a small miracle…

"Lily, wait!" Snape called after them.

"Keep walking," Lily said softly to herself. "Just keep walking. Just keep walking." She rounded the next corner, glanced both directions, and pushed open the flap of the nearest tent. Quickly, she ducked inside before Snape had a chance to chase her down.

Remus felt Lily tug on his hand again and joined her behind the tent flap. It fell back into place behind them, surrounding them both in darkness and the scent of stale incense. Beside him, he heard Lily take a shuddering breath and, without thinking, he placed an arm around her.

Silently, she moved closer to him, wrapping her arms around him and laying her head against his chest. Remus felt her bury her face in his shirt and, without realizing how it had happened, he found himself holding her, stroking her hair, and whispering to her that it would be okay.

Where had this calm persona come from? What was this thing that must have possessed his body temporarily? Why was he suddenly able to comfort a pretty girl in a dark tent like it was the most natural thing…?

Reality set in.

Oh, Merlin, he was holding Lily Evans in a dark tent. What was he _doing_? What was he thinking? He wasn't thinking, that was the problem, and now he was suddenly very aware of the way she smelled, the way her arms encircled him, the way she fit against him…

This was definitely _not_ sticking to the plan of not getting emotionally involved.

"I'm sorry," Lily whispered.

It took him a moment to realize she was likely talking about their encounter with Snape and not what she was doing to him. Remus cleared his throat. "Don't be." He breathed a silent prayer of relief when the words didn't come out as a squeak.

Lily untangled herself from his arms and stepped back. She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "He's a Death Eater," she said softly, a deep sadness in her voice as if she were telling him someone had passed away.

For the second time in ten minutes, Remus felt himself turn cold. "What?" There had been rumors the past few years that Slytherin House had several members who were staunch supporters of Voldemort, but as far as he could tell, they were just rumors. It was naiveté at its greatest, but he desperately needed to think of Hogwarts as this safe, nurturing place, someplace people like Voldemort and his Death Eaters couldn't infiltrate and destroy. It shouldn't come as a shock that a pro-Voldemort movement was occurring there. It was everywhere, in every corner of every city and village. But knowing someone who actually _was_ involved, it made it real.

"Him and his friends," Lily continued, elaborating. "They're all hoping to join You-Know-Who as soon as they can. They're so deep into the Dark Arts, Remus…and he used to be so nice." She paused. "What happens to a person to make him decide to become a monster?"

He wasn't sure if she was still talking about Snape or if she was talking about You-Know-Who. "I'm not sure."

"They frighten me," she admitted. "Sometimes I wonder, if things keep going the way the are…I'm afraid of what You-Know-Who and his followers might do to me and others like me. There are all kinds of stories about how they kill muggles, and how people are disappearing who disagree with them…."

"I heard my Mum and Dad talking about it a good deal this summer," Remus admitted. "Always in hushed tones, always when they think I can't hear them." He paused before adding, "It frightens me, too."

The tent flap opened before Lily could reply and they both turned towards it. Remus half expected to see Snape standing in the entrance, sneering at them victoriously. Instead, a middle-aged woman wearing a bright green turban, a long purple robe, and numerous bangled bracelets entered the tent and glared at them. "What are you kids doing in here? This is the inner sanctum of Madam Cleopatra! If you want to grope each other, the tunnel of love is three rows that way!" She jerked a thumb over her shoulder.

Remus felt himself turn red. "We weren't…."

"I don't care what you were or weren't. Out of my inner sanctum!" The muggle fortuneteller raised her right hand with a dramatic flourish and pointed out the entrance of the tent.

This time, it was he who took Lily's hand and led her from the tent. As they passed the fortuneteller, she muttered a phrase about "damned horny teenagers," causing him to blush again. He wouldn't have had the courage to so much as kiss Lily's cheek, let alone behave as a 'damn horny teenager' with her in a dark tent away from prying eyes, and he was positive he was one of the last people Lily Evans wanted to go into a dark tent with to do anything remotely related to the activities Madam Cleopatra implied. Of course, after their conversation, he figured he had a better chance than Snape.

What was he _thinking_? Why did he even want to imagine he had a better chance than anyone with Lily? Lily had made it very clear when they began that she _did not_ think of him that way.

And he had a plan. Cool, calm, detached. Play the part. Don't get emotionally involved. Help Lily. Don't betray James. If he just stuck to the plan, everything would be fine.

Things would have been much simpler if sticking to the plan wasn't becoming problematic.

~*~

Additional Disclaimer - I paraphrased one of the lines from movie-PoA for what Snape said to Remus because I wanted to make it clear what he was implying and Hermione's description in the movie did that. I always assumed she memorized it out of a text book, so Snape's recital of the phrase just made sense to me. I don't own that line.


	4. Chapter 4

**Part Four:**_ In which Remus becomes emotionally involved_

Since he was young, he'd been able to accomplish almost anything by making a detailed, well thought out plan and sticking to it. For example, his first year at Hogwarts, he'd wanted to make high marks; a werewolf with good grades in school for each and every year had a better chance – albeit a small one – to be able to do something somewhat normal with his life than one who barely scraped by, and Remus felt a strong need to show Dumbledore that his unfailing confidence in him wasn't wasted. The plan had included actually learning how to study, doing his reading before class and reviewing his notes after, asking the professors when he had questions, and giving one hundred percent to every homework assignment, much to the chagrin of his roommates who thought him a bit daft to care so much about first year grades. But it had been a successful plan, and, although he wasn't a genius like Sirius or James, he had performed well enough and continued to succeed in school.

If only Lily Evans was like school.

School didn't make him stop breathing when he saw it. He'd never had daydreams about his homework (although there was the time he'd fallen asleep in class after the full moon and had a nightmare in which Peter accidentally transfigured his homework into the Giant Squid, which then proceeded to try to eat every member of Gryffindor Tower). Well, he'd never had daydreams about his homework that would cause complete mortification if anyone ever learned of their contents. He certainly didn't blush furiously at the dinner table when his mother inquired how things were at Hogwarts.

After the funfair, he'd promised himself that he would stick to the plan of not getting emotionally involved with Lily Evans. Two weeks later, he realized that there was a fundamental flaw in that plan – he wasn't quite sure what he needed to do to accomplish it. When he spent time with Lily – something that was somehow happening more frequently as time passed - he tried to remind himself that James was in love with her. He tried to remind himself that, even if James hadn't been in love with her, he would still have had _no chance_ with Lily. He tried to tell himself that he could not enjoy pretending to be Lily's boyfriend and, above all else, could never imagine, even for a second, that it was real.

When he finally admitted to himself that the reminders did not work, it was too late. The plan was already spiraling out of control towards complete and total failure.

He was rapidly starting to feel things for Lily Evans that went beyond friendship. There had been several times in the past two weeks when he'd, in moments of complete weakness, allowed himself to fantasize about what it might be like to have a life with Lily when they were older and out of school. He'd imagined weddings and children and happily-ever-afters…all the things he desperately wanted and knew he would never have.

He couldn't tell Peter those things. To do so would be to admit that he had, in some way, betrayed James. He certainly couldn't tell James and Sirius, and he'd rather die than tell his parents, even if his father was normally very understanding when Remus came to him with a problem. So he was alone with the plan failing around him, all the while being forced to pretend that everything was perfectly fine.

"Remus?"

He looked up from the page of his potions book he'd been staring at and glanced beside him where Lily lay on her stomach, her own potions book open in front of her.

She gave him a small smile. "I just wanted to say – that is, I've wanted to tell you all day that – thank you."

"For what?" He lay down his quill on his book.

Lily fiddled with the quilt they'd brought with them to the park. "This summer. I mean, I'm sure there are a thousand other ways you'd rather spend your time than hanging around with me…"

No. The only other way he'd rather spend his time this summer definitely involved her... _Stop it, Remus. Thoughts like that are a recipe for disaster._

Lily didn't seem to notice his reaction. "And I really appreciate you being here for me. I don't think I could ever have handled Sev or Tuney without you."

Remus blinked. The way Lily was talking, he sounded like some gallant knight on a white horse instead of the awkward and often cowardly boy that he was. "It's really nothing, Lily. I've enjoyed it." Fearing he'd accidentally let on that the plan was barely still in existence, he quickly looked back down at his book and pretended to be engrossed in his reading.

"And you're so nice about it, too!" Lily exclaimed, not willing to let the subject drop. When she saw him look up from his book again, she quickly continued. "I mean, I'm sure you'd rather be charging through the countryside with your friends than lying on a blanket in a muggle park reading about potions and charms with me. I don't deny I'm boring."

If Lily was boring, he was sure he couldn't handle exciting. If she so much as touched his arm, his heart beat so rapidly he thought it was going to explode, and when she placed a tiny kiss on his cheek while telling him good-bye several days earlier, he thought he was going to suddenly fall over and die. Remus swallowed and, before he could stop himself, heard himself admitting one of his deepest, darkest secrets. "Lily, I wouldn't have given up what we've done this summer for anything." He wasn't sure where it had come from; he'd been _thinking_ it, but he'd never expected it to actually come out of his mouth. Remus froze, realizing just how much trouble he was in.

Instead of being repulsed at his confession, Lily's face broke into a gorgeous smile. "Me too."

Clearly, she had misunderstood him. Remus let out a breath he didn't realize he was holding. That was close. Way too close. He was doing rather lousy with this plan. Already, the lines were blurring together too much, and often he'd find himself on the wrong side of them. He never should have agreed to do this, never should have let her get so close.

Never should have let himself fall for James's girl.

Not sure what he should do now, he returned his gaze to his potions book but couldn't make out the words on the page. He was too aware of Lily beside him. And she was still looking at him. Slowly, he looked up from the book. "What?"

"Remus, I," Lily took a deep breath, "I need to tell you that, well, this summer, I mean to say, there might have been an ulterior, I…"

Oh, sweet Merlin, she was leaning in closer to him. Remus was aware she was talking – stumbling over words that he couldn't make out…. Her head was so close to his, and her voice had dropped to a whisper. She tilted her head to the side, her eyes closing…it was almost like she wanted…

Like she wanted him to kiss her?!

No, he was imaging it. He was misunderstanding something. Or daydreaming. Maybe he'd fallen asleep on his potions book. In a moment, he would wake up to ink smeared on his face from his quill, and, feeling quite embarrassed, wouldn't be able to look her in the eye for days. Yes.

Any minute now.

Okay, Lupin, time to wake up…

Oh, Merlin, why were his eyes closing?

What was he doing?

He was going to kiss her.

He couldn't kiss her. Wait, why couldn't he kiss her? Something about James Potter…yes, James liked her…but he liked her, too…why shouldn't he kiss her…she wanted him to kiss her…he wanted to kiss her…

He was going to kiss her.

Remus took a deep breath, praying he didn't get it wrong, and leaned in to commit the greatest sin of his life.

"Lily!"

Remus's eyes flew open as Lily jumped away from him. Lily's older sister was standing a few feet away, a look of horror and disgust on her face.

"What are you _doing_?" Petunia Evans's voice sounded horribly screechy, and Remus found himself with the groggy and irrational thought that it was a shame she was a muggle as she could make a lot of money recording howlers with a voice like that.

"I, we…" Lily's face went completely red.

"We were studying," Remus offered weakly.

"Is that what they're calling it now?" Petunia asked angrily. "Lily, I cannot believe you! In public?! People might see! What would they think?"

"Tuney…" Lily started, her voice pleading.

Petunia pretended she didn't hear her. "I'll tell you what they'll think. 'Oh, there's that freak Evans girl and her freak boyfriend having a shag in the park!' That's what they'd think."

"If Lily and I were going to shag, we'd at least relocate to the bushes," Remus remarked coldly. Where had _that_ come from? It sounded like something Sirius would say. This whole thing with Lily had really done a number on his mind. This was why girls were dangerous.

Lily set her mouth in a hard line as she glared up at her older sister. "Did you need something, Tuney?"

"Mum and Dad wanted me to fetch you for dinner," she glanced at Remus. "He'll have to go back where the other freaks live now." She sounded disgusted.

"I'll be there in a few minutes," Lily remarked, flipping her book shut. She turned to Remus, "You're welcome to stay for dinner if you'd like. Mum and Dad really like you, and I'm sure they wouldn't mind."

Petunia made a little noise of distress at the invitation, then quickly turned and retreated back the way she came, most likely unable to bear another minute of Lily's or Remus's presence.

"That's okay." He didn't want to be the cause of any more strife for Lily. It was clear she adored her sister, but Petunia only seemed to want to criticize Lily at every opportunity. If his absence at dinner saved Lily from any additional humiliation at the hands of her older sister, it would be worth it. Of course, he couldn't tell Lily that, and quickly searched for a decent excuse. "I wouldn't be able to stay, anyway. If I did, I'd miss my train." He began gathering up his things.

"Are you sure you don't want to stay and then Floo back to your house?" Lily asked, sliding her quill into the front pocket of her school bag. She seemed determined not to look him in the eye, and he found he couldn't blame her for it.

Remus concentrated on returning his own school things to their proper places. "I already bought a return ticket for the train and I'd feel guilty not using it." He stood and stretched, trying not to think about what might have happened had Petunia not arrived when she had. He'd come so close to doing something completely unforgivable…and he wasn't sure that, if the opportunity presented itself again, he wanted to stop himself. "But thank you." He paused, then added, "I might Floo next time."

"You should. My parents don't mind, if that's what you're worried about. They're very eager to learn about our world." Lily straightened up, grabbing the blanket.

Remus shouldered his bag and picked up hers. What did Lily keep in here? It was easily twice as heavy as his. He shifted her bag to his other hand. "I wasn't sure after your sister…"

"She's just uncomfortable around things she doesn't understand," Lily interrupted him. "She'll come around someday." The unspoken 'I hope' hung in the air, painfully obvious to them both.

Not knowing what to say in response, Remus fell into step beside her as they started back towards her home. After several moments of silence, he cleared his throat. "You aren't a freak, you know."

"I know," She sounded like she didn't quite believe it. "Remus, if I tell you something, will you promise not to laugh?"

He doubted anything Lily could say would fall into the category of sensitive-but-hilarious. "I promise."

"Sometimes, I feel like I don't quite fit anywhere. At home, I'm different and at school, well, I'm muggle born and sometimes I feel like I've missed out on something." She sighed, shaking her head. "I know it sounds silly, but so often I feel like I'm an outsider, no matter what world I'm in."

His initial thought was that he couldn't comprehend how Lily could ever be an outsider. Then again, she hadn't been raised in their world. It must be difficult to find out one day that you're able to do things that no one else in your family can do, then find a world filled with people like you only to learn most look down on you because your family isn't like them. Lily was right; people were never comfortable around a person they didn't understand. He'd known that for years, his parents had whispered it to him over and over again when he was younger and hurt by the way people treated him. He just never really thought about how there were other groups of people who weren't treated properly for the same reasons. Without thinking, he reached out and took her hand, giving it a small squeeze. "I'm sorry."

"It's not your fault," she said quickly. "You've never done anything to make me feel that way."

He glanced over at her out of the corner of his eye. "I'm still sorry."

He felt Lily squeeze his hand back. "Thanks." She took a deep breath and let it out slowly as they stopped on the sidewalk in front of her home. "I'm sorry about what Tuney said about you."

He shrugged. "I've been called worse." In many ways 'freak' was a step up.

Lily smiled slightly, "Yes, I suppose Slytherin House is much more imaginative with their insults. What was it they called Sirius Black first year?"

"A perfidious little git," Remus recited. "He knew they'd insulted him, but had to look up what 'perfidious' meant to know exactly how his honor had been besmirched. I believe he borrowed your dictionary to do so."

"And then tried to attack Lucius Malfoy," Lily finished. She giggled slightly. "I don't think a first year had ever lost points for his house so soon into his Hogwarts education before, and by taking a swing at a prefect no less."

"We all still believe it was worth it," Remus informed her.

Lily opened her mouth to respond when the front door to the house opened and Petunia stomped outside. She glared at them in a way that would give Snape serious competition in the 'sneers and loathing' category, and announced, "We're eating," before turning on her heel and stomping back inside the house. The door slammed shut behind her.

Lily continued to gaze at the house for a second before looking back at him. "Well…I guess I should go inside before Mum and Dad ask Tuney to fetch me a third time."

"Yeah." Remus nodded, wondering why he suddenly felt so awkward. He'd dropped Lily off at home several times, and it was usually a quick 'good-bye' with a hug. Except for last time, when she'd kissed his cheek.

Lily took her school bag from him and deposited it along with the blanket in her front yard. "Are you sure you don't want to stay?"

"I'm sure. My parents would get worried if I didn't show up when they expect me to." He paused, watching her carefully. He'd been planning on doing this all day and, with the day nearly over, it was now or never. He could do this. It was just asking a friend – only a friend! – to spend time with him. He asked Peter, James, and Sirius all the time. Lily wasn't any different. _Here it goes…_ "Uh, Lily, um, if you aren't doing anything next weekend and want to give Snape a good excuse for not spending time with him, uh, you could come visit me in London." Seeing her look at him strangely, he quickly added, "We could just work on Slughorn's assignments some more; there's no one at my place we have to try to fool or anything. Or we could meet up with Peter and catch a movie or…"

"Remus." Lily put a hand over his mouth. "I'd love to come to London next weekend."

He suddenly felt lightheaded and had the urge to scoop her up, swing her around, and cheer. Lily Evans had said yes! She said yes! She wanted to spend time with - reality stepped in at that moment and slugged him in the stomach – her _fake_ boyfriend. The lightheaded feeling quickly dissipated, leaving the dull pain in his stomach. "Great, well, I'll see you then." He shifted his school bag, leaned forward to give her a chaste hug as always, and started down the sidewalk.

He'd only made it a few steps when the guilt churned in his stomach. No matter how he classified it, deep down he knew he asked Lily to London as more than a friend and he suddenly hated himself for doing so. Maybe he should just owl the day before and tell her he wasn't feeling well. No. No, she wanted to spend the day with him. If she wanted to spend time with James, she could ask James. And she hadn't, had she? She didn't want to spend the summer with James, but with him. Was it really fair for him not to want to spend the summer with her? And anyways…

"Remus! Remus, wait a sec!" Lily called after him. "You forgot something."

He paused and turned back towards her, fumbling for his school bag. He was pretty sure he'd gathered up everything in the park. There were his books, the parchment he'd used to take notes, his quill and ink….

Lily skidded to a stop in front of him, a nervous little smile on her face. She looked up at him in a way that caused him to suddenly forgot to breathe, and, as he tried to search his mind to remember just how the whole breathing thing worked, Lily quickly reached a hand behind his head, drew him down to her, and gently kissed him on the mouth.

Remus froze as she stepped back and watched as she brought her hand to her lips, an almost dreamy expression on her face. He must have passed out when he'd forgotten to breathe, because this just could not be happening. Lily Evans did not just kiss him in the street in front of her family, neighborhood, God, and anyone else who happened to wander by. He heard rather than felt himself drop his school bag with a loud "clunk" beside him.

Lily gave him a small, almost smug, smile. "Night, Remus." She turned and started back towards her house, pausing to gather the things she'd left on the lawn, seemingly unaware that he was blatantly staring at her as she did so. Pushing the door to her home open, she turned around and looked at him again. "See you next week."


	5. Chapter 5

**Part Five:**_ In which Remus lies and Sirius demonstrates his superior math skills_

"Moony, you're good friends with Evans, aren't you?"

Remus froze as James dropped to the ground beside him. He glanced around for Peter or Sirius – even James's mum – anyone to help him avoid the conversation he was sure was about to follow. Unfortunately, Sirius and Peter were still inside the Potters' large home gathering snacks, and James's parents were nowhere to be seen. Remus realized James was waiting for an answer, and that he wasn't quite sure how to respond. 'Sure, Prongs, Lily and I spend tons of time together. Just last night I kissed her in the middle of her street' was definitely _not_ an option. "I – she's polite to me." It wasn't a lie, Remus told himself. Lily was always nice to him.

"At school, you two spent a lot of time doing," James frowned, "Well, whatever it is prefects do together."

"Enforce the rules?" Remus supplied, somewhat preoccupied. Visions of himself and Lily had risen to the front of his mind – of what they'd done and about what he was secretly hoping they'd do.

No! He couldn't think about those things. Last night was a mistake, and, anyways, _she_ kissed _him_. And he was going to tell her that she could never do that again, even if he desperately wanted her to. He might have crossed lines he shouldn't have last night, but as of this morning the lines were firmly back in place and he had no intention of ever crossing them again. He could be friends with Lily, but he could not – would not – ever allow himself to go back down the road he'd started on yesterday. It was wrong. He was better than that. He wouldn't do that to James again.

"You must be somewhat close." James ignored his comment about a prefect's duty and continued on. "She ever tell you stuff?"

Remus frowned. "We talk, if that's what you mean." He watched his friend a moment before adding, "She's written me a couple of times this summer to discuss a project we're working on." Project. Yeah. Sure.

"Oh. She, uh," James began to fidget, "She ever tell you if she's, uh, seeing anyone?"

And there it was. The question that he'd always known he'd be asked, sooner or later. He'd just hoped it would have been later. Much, much later. So he had to decide, did he tell James the truth or did he lie to his best friend's face?

"As far as I know, Lily isn't romantically involved with anyone." He hated himself as soon as he said it. It wasn't exactly a lie – Lily wasn't actually romantically involved with him – but it wasn't exactly the truth, either. But he was already in too deep. He couldn't exactly get out of his promise to Lily yet, though he would be able to eventually. He just had to buy himself a little more time, and then he'd tell James the truth. All of it. But if his friend knew the truth now, well, things looked pretty bad. James would likely get the wrong impression and, if he did, Remus wasn't sure James would still consider him his friend.

"Yeah." James didn't seem to be too comforted by this information. "I guess."

"If you're worried about Snape, she can't stand him anymore after he called her, well, you know," Remus offered. That wasn't exactly a secret. Almost everyone in their house knew that Lily had it out with Snape outside the portrait hole after exams. Or at least, everyone knew the rumor. He wasn't quite sure what was said, but Mary MacDonald had promised him and anyone else that would listen that Lily had told Snape to stay far away from her.

James sighed. "It's not Snivellus." He looked around as if he was checking for eavesdroppers. "Look, Moony, I know this sounds pathetic – and don't you ever tell Padfoot because he'd never let me hear the end of it - but I might have written to a couple of her friends. You know, to see if I could subtly figure out where I stood. Girls tell their friends that sort of thing. One of them mentioned that Evans said in her last letter that she fell hard for someone after school let out."

His stomach did a little flip as his heart started pounding loudly. Lily couldn't have told her friend that about _him_, could she? Remus was suddenly aware that he'd stopped breathing. "I doubt that," he managed to get out. Somehow, by an even greater miracle, he managed to sound normal. "I mean, doesn't she live in some tiny village up north? I don't think there are a ton of blokes there to begin with, and she's awful picky."

"Maybe," James said, though he sounded as if he didn't believe it. "But what if she likes muggles? I'm, well," he waved a hand around them, "Most definitely not a muggle."

"I honestly don't believe she's involved with anyone," Remus said softly. "Muggle or not."

"That's not it, Moony," James said, looking absolutely miserable. "She's been real secretive about it, but I know there's someone. Padfoot was in London yesterday and when he got back he said he heard a rumor that she was seeing someone."

It didn't take a genius to figure out where that rumor originated. While it appeared that, for the time, Snape wasn't going to announce that Remus was a werewolf, he was taking advantage of the fact that he'd made no vow of silence regarding what he knew about Remus and Lily. That Snape hadn't actually named names was surprising. Then again, he now got to sit back and watch them squirm as they worried about what would happen if James or one of the others put it together.

Beside him, James took a deep breath. "Look, could you ask her? Find out what's going on? She'll tell you. She thinks you're decent and all."

Why, he wondered, did James have to ask that of him? "I don't know if she'd tell me something like that, Prongs, but I can ask." Remus frowned and quickly seized upon the only potential change of subject that wouldn't look suspicious. "Wait, why was Padfoot in London yesterday?"

"Had to meet up with Andromeda," Sirius remarked behind them.

They both jumped slightly and twisted around at the sound of his voice. Sirius had always been good at being quiet when he needed to; most of his greatest feats would never have happened if he hadn't been. Lately, he was getting so good it was as if he was a ghost.

"Who?" Remus asked, wondering briefly if Andromeda was a leggy blonde witch who'd finally managed to make the conquest every girl in Hogwarts dreamed of making.

"My cousin," Sirius elaborated. "The one who married a muggle-born. She heard about what happened with my mum and wanted to help. She offered to let me stay with her and her husband, but they've got this little two room flat that's already too small for them and their kid."

Remus stared at him. "I'm sorry. Did you just say you have a cousin who married a muggle-born?" He tried to imagine how the House of Black took that one. The images that sprung to mind weren't pretty.

"Yeah. I only met her once that I really remember before the family disowned her. Figures they get rid of the only normal one." He dumped an arm-full of butterbeer on the ground between Remus and James. "Anyway, she wanted me to know that I wasn't alone and that I've got family if I wanted them. I'm supposed to go back this weekend and spend time with them." He inclined his head back to the house. "We should probably go save Wormtail. Mrs. Potter's talking his ear off about our OWLs. I think she's worried that Prongs here won't get anything above Troll." Sirius grinned.

James sighed, climbing to his feet. "I told her they went fine."

"I think that's why she's worried, Prongsie," Sirius replied.

James started towards the house, muttering something under his breath while shaking his head, and Remus moved to follow him. A hand on his chest stopped him, and he turned to see Sirius giving him a grim look. He frowned. "What?"

"Prongs asked you about Lily Evans." It wasn't a question.

Oh, Merlin, Sirius knew. The stormy look in his gray eyes told him that much. Remus felt himself swallow and tried to be rational. There was no way Sirius, who had seen him a total of two times since his little charade with Lily began, knew anything. _Although if you don't stop acting paranoid, he'll figure it out right soon enough._ "He wanted me to ask her if she's seeing anyone," he replied, trying to pretend as if the conversation he'd had with James was just another of their talks on the subject of Lily.

"I know," Sirius's voice became softer, "That you wouldn't do anything to let him down."

Remus found himself unable to meet his friend's eyes and focused instead on James's retreating back. "I promised I'd ask her."

"I want you to understand something. James Potter has been better to me than anyone else I've ever known. So if you do anything to betray him…" Sirius let the threat trail off.

He wanted to say that he wouldn't, that he'd be the last person to do anything like that to James. He wanted to swear he was just as loyal and trustworthy as Peter and as willing to fight to the death for his friends as Sirius. He wanted to promise that he was not involved with Lily Evans and would never think of getting involved with her.

But none of those things were true, so he said nothing.

Sirius slapped something against Remus's chest as he stepped past him to follow James. "You dropped this the last time you were here." Without so much as a look back, he broke into a jog and took off after James. "Oi! Prongs, wait up!"

Remus glanced down at the parchment Sirius had given him and noticed Lily's neat handwriting. He shut his eyes, suddenly feeling nauseous. Lily's first letter. It must have fallen out of his pocket when he and Peter came to try to cheer up Sirius when his family disowned him. And Sirius found it, and put together the rumors Snape was circulating about Lily's new boyfriend with the letter….

Now, he was sure he really was in trouble.

~*~

---------

"Sirius knows."

Peter frowned, "About what?"

"Lily." Remus began pacing back and forth in front of the back stoop to his home. "He found a letter she wrote to me and figured it out."

"Are you sure? I mean, how could Sirius find your mail?" Peter asked, skeptically.

"I had a letter from Lily and I shoved it in my pocket and…I guess it fell out in Godric's Hollow. When I realized it was missing, I thought Mum took it." He couldn't believe this was happening. Everything was so messed up; he was going to lose everything that mattered. His friends would clearly hate him.

Peter didn't say anything.

Remus stopped and turned to face his last remaining friend. "What am I going to do?"

"Well," Peter sounded hesitant, "You might, that is, you could tell them the truth." Once he'd started, his speech picked up speed. "I mean, it'd be best if you told James what happened before Sirius does. He'll understand that it was all a big prank then, and he can explain to Sirius that there's nothing between you and Lily. You should probably tell Sirius the truth, too. He's really eaten up over thinking you're snogging Lily Evans senseless behind James's back. He even cornered me today to ask me about it."

Remus felt his eyes narrow. "He cornered you about it? When was this?" He couldn't remember a time when Peter wasn't around during the afternoon. After his talk with James and Sirius, he'd made sure the only friend he knew had his back was close by.

"When we went inside to get butterbeer, before James's mum started talking to us about how she's sure James spent more time in detention than in class and she's terrified he won't get any OWLs." A muscle in Peter's cheek twitched. "He just wanted to ask me a couple of questions, and I answered them, but I didn't tell him about you pretending to be Lily's boyfriend. He isn't certain that you're doing anything wrong, but he suspects you are."

Suddenly, the contents of the conversation between Peter and Sirius were the most important thing ever. "What did he say?"

Peter scrunched up his face like he was trying hard to remember. "He said he figured I was your closest friend and if you confided in anyone it would be me. And then he said that it might sound ridiculous, but he wanted to know if you'd told me about anything going on between you and Lily. I told him that I knew you'd met up with her a couple of times over the summer, but that you weren't anything more than her friend. I told him that you'd never do that to James."

With a sigh, Remus dropped onto the back stoop beside Peter and covered his face with his hands.

"Was that wrong?" Peter suddenly sounded nervous and upset. "I tried to tell him the truth but not let on about your, uh, arrangement. I didn't mean to say something wrong, Remus."

"It's okay, Pete." He dropped his hands to his lap. "You didn't say anything wrong. I'm just…" Remus shut his eyes and admitted his greatest sin. "I kissed her."

"As part of the deception," Peter said hurriedly, as if he was unwilling to believe the truth, unwilling to believe that his friend Remus could be so coldhearted and treacherous.

"No," Remus whispered. He opened his eyes.

Peter was staring at him in shock.

"We were alone and it just…happened," he tried to explain. "I never meant…things were never supposed to…I just…it was a mistake."

Peter found his voice. "Wh-why?"

"Why was it a mistake? How long a list do you need?" He pushed himself to his feet and started to pace again. "James is in love with her. She's the only thing he's ever wanted. I'm a werewolf!"

"That's not...I don't see…" Peter trailed off and was silent for several moments as his face took on the expression he wore when contemplating something difficult. He looked up. "Re-Remus?" His voice was hesitant. "You didn't…fall in love with her, did you?"

He didn't say anything. He couldn't deny it – his feelings for Lily Evans went far beyond friendship. He didn't dare admit it, either; to do so seemed like the ultimate betrayal.

His non-answer was enough.

"Oh." Peter was silent a moment. "Remus, I should probably be getting home. You know how my mum can worry."

His last hope had been that Peter would understand, would be able to see how easy it had been to fall into making this mistake. It was hard, sometimes, to be the ordinary blokes who were friends with the ever-so-extraordinary James Potter and Sirius Black. It was hard to watch as James and Sirius got pretty much everything they wanted. And then this girl - this beautiful, smart, funny, amazing girl – she could have chosen James Potter, and she could have chosen Sirius Black, but she didn't. She chose Remus Lupin. And even if it was pretend on her end, was it really fair to blame poor, ordinary, forgotten Remus Lupin for falling for this girl just because James Potter also had? He sighed, knowing he was completely alone on this one. "Yeah, Pete, you're right. You should probably get going."


	6. Chapter 6

**Part Six:**_ In which Remus makes choices and has regrets_

All he wanted was one perfect day.

For one day, he would let himself imagine that he was normal. He could believe that Lily really did care for him – love him, even – the way he cared for her. He could believe that they were like any other couple, happy to be spending a beautiful, summer day together. He could imagine that the same futures available to everyone around him were also available to him.

One perfect day, in which he wasn't Remus J. Lupin: werewolf; just Remus J. Lupin: normal bloke who was head over heels for his girlfriend.

After today, he'd talk with Lily, let her know they had to make sure they were friends – just friends. He'd come clean with James, tell him about the prank on Snape and maybe even admit that he'd gotten a little carried away but had fixed things and never meant any harm. Everything would go back to the way it was meant to be. That would be for the best, anyway. He couldn't hold out any unrealistic hope that James would be okay with his friend dating the girl he liked, and he definitely couldn't entertain the thought that Lily would accept him if she knew the truth. Even if – miracle of miracles – she did, he knew he couldn't actually have a life with her. He was dangerous, being with him was dangerous, and he would never be able to live with himself if he killed her or, worse, caused her to become like him. No, at the end of the day, he'd have to put everything back where it had been at the start of the summer.

Leaving him with one perfect day.

"You know," Lily interrupted his thoughts as she licked her spoon before gathering another bite of the rapidly disappearing ice cream sundae on the table, "I think this is one of the best sundaes I've ever eaten." Her eyes lit up. "Oh! Remus! Did I tell you what I got?"

He shook his head, helping himself to another bite of the sundae that was technically his, but had somehow found its location shifting closer and closer to Lily. He was never going to believe a girl who turned down desert to just 'take one or two bites' of his ever again; this was clearly girl code for 'I don't want to order one myself but I'll gladly eat all of yours.'

Lily produced a piece of parchment from her purse. "Well, you know how we've been wracking our brains over Slughorn's summer assignments. I've just been out of my mind with worry that I blew the Potions OWL and wasn't even going to get to take the NEWT level course, and I started to think that maybe all our hard work was for nothing, so I finally broke down and wrote to Professor Slughorn, telling him about how you and I are hoping to be in his class and we've started on the work already and everything." She beamed. "Well, he wrote back, and said that he's not supposed to tell us, but we've both made OWLs and we're in and, here, you can read it." She almost bounced in her seat as she gave him the letter.

"I shouldn't read private correspondence between you and a teacher," he protested, passing the folded parchment back to her.

"Well, you're in it, too. Here." She opened the parchment and searched for a moment. "'I am pleased to hear that you and Mr. Lupin are taking such an interest in your studies this summer. You are both very bright and I am delighted to continue instructing you next term.' I really think he likes us." She folded the parchment and returned it to her purse, still giddy.

Remus tried not to snort. He highly doubted that the Head of Slytherin House had happy thoughts when he considered Hogwarts's resident werewolf and knew the man was just saying nice things to keep his favorite pupil happy. He couldn't tell Lily that, though. Remus searched for a safe segue in conversation. "I just hope my marks are strong across the board."

"I'm sure they are. Honestly, Remus, you're one of the hardest working people in our class." Lily helped herself to more of his sundae. "I mean, yeah, the Ravenclaws are bright, and then you've got Potter and Black who are geniuses but never apply themselves, but you actually _try_. The people who succeed aren't always the ones with the most raw intelligence; they're the ones who really apply themselves. And you're smart _and_ you work hard. I'm sure you blew us all out of the water."

He felt himself blush at her praise, however untrue it might be. After several weeks of Lily's company, he would have thought he'd stop turning red at every little thing, but when she complimented him…

"And now you're turning all red, like you don't believe me." Lily continued. She made a little clucking sound. "Honestly, Remus, what are you? Some kind of crazy perfectionist?"

"I'm just nervous," he admitted. "I want to do well. There's a lot riding on my OWLs."

Something passed in front of her eyes so quickly that he nearly missed it. Lily nodded once. "I suppose there is." She pointed at the sundae with her spoon, a small smile on her face. "Are you going to finish this?"

"It's yours." He had been fighting a losing battle in reclaiming his ice cream for the past twenty minutes. Besides, if it made Lily happy, he'd gladly let her have it. Remus leaned back in his chair, stretched, and glanced around them. Wizards and witches shuffled down Diagon Alley just beyond Fortescue's outdoor sitting area, packages clutched in their hands. They moved with quiet purpose, as if they wanted to avoid spending any more time than necessary among their peers. Odd. Hardly anyone paused for conversation or to greet an old friend. Most of the people here today were keeping their heads down, minding their own business, except…. His eyes landed on a small cluster of people in front of Gringotts and he groaned. "Oh no."

"What's wrong?" Lily asked, looking up from the remnants of the sundae and glancing around Diagon Alley.

"Sirius." Remus nodded across the crowd at where his friend was standing, back to them, and speaking with a young couple holding a small girl. That must be Andromeda, the cousin who married a muggle-born wizard, said muggle-born wizard, and their daughter. Sirius was supposed to be meeting them in London today. Why hadn't he remembered?

"I thought he was one of your friends," Lily commented quietly, confusion evident on her face.

"He's re-evaluating our friendship since he believes I'm betraying James by dating you," Remus explained. He felt a sudden need to duck into the nearest shop – Eeylop's Owl Emporium – and hide amongst the cages. It would not look good if Sirius saw him strolling through Diagon Alley with Lily, even though he knew they had struck up a friendship working together during fifth year. After the letter, coupled with Snape's rumors and Sirius's overactive imagination (that unfortunately had a bad habit of being right on target about some things, like where his friend might really be disappearing to every month), well, it was better not to risk it.

"You didn't tell them?" Lily seemed surprised. "Really, Remus, I don't mind if they know. I don't want to cause problems between you and your friends."

"I told Peter, but I couldn't tell James because he'd tell Sirius, and I can't tell Sirius because, well, it's rather stupid to trust Sirius with any important information." He heard his voice become bitter. This whole situation really was Sirius's fault. If Sirius didn't have to be so lousy at keeping people's secrets a, well, secret, then Remus wouldn't have had to hide his arrangement with Lily from his friends.

Yes. All Sirius's fault.

Lily glanced back at Sirius and the rest of the Blacks – or whatever their name actually was; at the moment, Remus was tempted to call them the Purples, as the little girl's hair was a loud shade of violet – and asked, "You want to get out of here?"

He was never so excited to leave Fortescue's. "Yes." Remus tossed a few knuts on the table beside the now-empty sundae bowl for a tip and offered Lily his hand.

Her left hand slid into his and she gestured down Diagon Alley with her right, away from Gringotts and Sirius. "Let's go hide in Flourish and Blotts," she suggested, leaning in to him in a conspiratorial manner, "I can't really see Sirius Black taking his friends for an outing in a bookstore."

"Relatives. They're his relatives," Remus corrected. He knew Lily's statement held an insulting implication about Sirius, and normally he would have told her not to go there, but he was still a bit miffed at Sirius for the confrontation the other night so he kept quiet. Besides, Lily _was_ right; there was no way Sirius was going to take his relatives into the bookstore. They were most likely headed for something like Quality Quidditch Supplies, or maybe they were just meeting in Diagon Alley because of its location and were then headed elsewhere. Oh, please let them be headed elsewhere.

Remus glanced over his shoulder and felt a sudden rush of adrenaline as he hurried through the single-minded shoppers, pulling Lily along with him. Knowing that Sirius could turn around any minute and see them…and they were going to get away with it. He wanted to laugh. It was better than pranking Peeves. Better than getting away with their after-curfew misdeeds. Better than...

He shouldn't feel this way. It was selfish and arrogant and went against everything he knew was right. Part of him hated himself for the feeling; the other part reveled in it. He hated himself more.

"Remus, wait." Lily tugged on his hand, causing him to stop. When he shot her a curious look, she pointed. Snape had just exited Flourish and Blotts, a thick book tucked under one arm.

"Damn." He glanced back over his shoulder. Despite the distance between them, Remus could still make out Sirius obliviously talking with his relatives at the far end of the street. He looked back towards the bookstore, knowing they were trapped. "Damn, damn." Snape had seen them.

"Lily!" Snape's face broke into a smile, and Remus could tell the boy was excited to see her. The Slytherin paused as his eyes fell on Remus and narrowed. His face turned into a scowl, and he started stalking towards them, muttering darkly to himself. Memories of his last encounter with Snape quickly sprung to mind.

"Back the other way!" Lily whispered. "Quick." She didn't seem to want a confrontation with Snape any more than he did.

He didn't have to be told twice. Together, they turned and started to run in the opposite direction, dodging through the shoppers and ducking around carts and stalls in a slightly twisted game of hide-and-go-seek. Lily glanced over her shoulder and suddenly changed direction again, throwing herself in the gap between two stalls (one selling 'curse-protectors' and another selling brightly colored scarves) and pulling him in beside her. Remus felt her place a hand over his mouth. He looked over at her and saw her other hand over her own mouth, her eyes laughing. She winked at him, and he knew she'd felt the same rush escaping from Snape as he'd had avoiding Sirius.

They remained pressed against the side of the stall as Snape stalked past, his dark eyes darting back and forth trying to find them. Unaware of their hiding place, he continued down the alley, his dark cloak billowing behind him. Remus briefly wondered if Snape purposely dressed the way he did because he thought it made him look intimidating. If that was the goal, Snape certainly failed miserably. He looked more like a ridiculous cross between a greasy vampire and a deranged bat than any sort of fear-inspiring dark wizard. Remus snickered to himself at the thought.

"What?" Lily asked.

He glanced over at her. "Nothing." He doubted Lily would find his observations of her former friend as humorous as he did. After a long ten count, he leaned out into the walkway slightly. Snape hadn't stopped and Remus could see the boy's back retreating further away towards Gringotts. "I think we lost him." He ducked back between the stalls.

"You know," Lily said softly, her voice full of amusement, "I'm beginning to notice a pattern when Sev's involved."

Remus put on his most serious face, one often utilized at school to project the idea that he would never dream of interrupting a Transfiguration lecture, and looked down at Lily. "At least this time no one is going to barge in here and accuse me of making a move on you."

Her eyes took on a mischievous glint. "You mean you wouldn't try to make a move on me?" She made a little tsking sound. "Remus Lupin, sometimes you're too honorable for your own good."

He shot her a confused look. Surely Lily didn't think he would have tried to do anything when she had been near tears after the way Snape had spoken to her at the funfair. He would never take advantage of a moment of weakness like that.

Lily watched him and shook her head. "You know, for someone so smart, sometimes you're absolutely clueless." Without giving him a chance to respond, she closed the distance between them, rose onto her toes, and kissed him.

Remus felt his muscles stiffen. He promised he wouldn't do this again. He promised that he was only going to be Lily's friend. He promised –

To hell with it.

Not caring about promises or worries as to whether or not he was doing it right, he pulled Lily to him and returned the kiss. His right arm wrapped around her waist and he let his left hand tangle in her hair. Lily pressed against him, her arms now tightly around his neck. A jolt shot through him as her lips parted under his...

And he gave himself completely to the kiss.

All too soon, Lily broke away. She stared up at him, her eyes slightly glazed. "Remus, that, that," she took a ragged breath, "I mean. Wow."

He knew he didn't have a prayer of forming coherent words, let alone sentences, at that moment. He'd never felt anything like that, never hoped he'd have a chance to experience it, never thought he could be as absolutely, sublimely happy as he was in this very moment. Knowing he was probably wearing the goofiest smile in the history of the world, he leaned forward to rest his forehead against hers, wanting nothing more than to stay there forever. "Lily, I…"

It happened too fast; his mind was still so cloudy from the kiss as something pulled him backwards and pain slammed against the side of his face. Diagon Alley spun in a whirl of colors as his head snapped around and he caught a brief glimpse of his attacker's long black hair.

Snape.

He didn't think; he just acted. Remus was vaguely aware of Lily shouting something as he launched himself towards the other boy, his shoulder connecting with Snape's stomach. Together, they crashed into one of the stalls, sending bits of broken table and bright colored scarves scattering through the air. Fists pummeling, they rolled about the wreckage until Remus found himself slammed up in the corner between the wall of the building behind the stall and the street. With a snarl, he looked up at Snape.

Except it wasn't Snape.

Sirius Black uttered a curse at him as his fist connected with Remus's face. This time, Remus stopped fighting back and let it happen. Sirius let off another punch, and Remus was vaguely aware that his once-friend was shouting at him about being a traitor and about James and about how they had trusted him.

"Sirius!" A woman yelled as his friend hit him again. "Sirius! That's enough!" At the same time, Lily was screaming "Stop it! Stop it!" as she tried to pull Sirius off of him.

Two pairs of large hands finally yanked Sirius away – the former stall's owner and Andromeda's husband. Sirius shouted something unintelligible at him as his relatives put some distance between him and Remus.

Remus stared after him. He'd just attacked Sirius. It didn't matter that he thought Sirius had been Snape – even if he had been, to just attack someone, to engage in a round of muggle dueling in the middle of the street like, like…

Like an animal.

He felt ill. What was happening to him? He wasn't someone who lied to his friends. He wasn't someone who rationalized actions that _he knew were wrong_ just because he desperately wanted to get his way. He wasn't violent. Yet he was becoming that person, becoming all of the things he never wanted to be.

And then Lily was kneeling in front of him, taking his face in her hands. "Oh, Remus. Remus, are you alright?"

"I'm fine," he muttered, pushing himself into a seated position and rubbing at his face. His skull was pounding, he could feel the swelling already starting in his jaw and cheekbone, but it could have been worse. Full moons hurt a hell of a lot more and caused far more extensive damages than a round of muggle dueling in the center of the street.

"No you aren't. You're bleeding!" Lily exclaimed, touching the side of his mouth with her hand.

He winced, pulling back. "Lily, I'm fine."

"Oh, this is all my fault," she said, wringing her hands once before continuing to examine his wounds. "I never should have brought you into this, Remus. I should have known something like this…"

No, it was his fault. He never should have kissed her. He never should have spent the summer with her. He never should have betrayed his friends for a girl.

Unable to look at Lily, Remus chose that moment to take in the scene, trying to find his most-likely-former friend. He had to tell Sirius that he'd been right about him. He needed to say that he was sorry. He hadn't meant to hurt James. He hadn't meant for any of this to happen. He needed to beg for forgiveness; maybe there was still a chance to salvage Sirius's friendship. Where was Sirius?

The crowd that had gathered to watch two friends pummel each other was now dissipating. Andromeda was talking with the stall owner, most likely offering to pay for the damage. And there. Sirius was being led off by Andromeda's husband, who had literally scruffed him in the process. There was no hope of getting to him. And now Snape – the real Snape - was standing in front of them, a nasty grin on his face.

Remus suddenly knew how Sirius learned exactly where to find him and Lily. Snape had seen them after all, and, in true Slytherin fashion, manipulated everyone to get exactly what he wanted. "You."

Snape's grin became larger. "You know, Lupin," he remarked causally, "I never thought someone would be stupid enough to fall for his own trick, but clearly I was wrong."

Lily stiffened, a look of pain on her face. She jumped to her feet, whirled about, and advanced on Snape. "Severus, what did you _do_?!" Her tiny hands curled into fists.

He shrugged. "Nothing. I just told Black that if he wanted to know what Lupin was up to, all he had to do was walk down here and glance between the stalls." Snape looked immensely pleased with himself. He sneered down at Remus, enjoying the irony.

There was nothing to say in response. He knew he'd lost everything that mattered. Even if he'd known what to say, he felt too broken and defeated to even move, so he just stared up at the other boy. Without so much as lifting a finger, Snape had won.

There was a loud crack as Lily's open palm connected with Snape's face. "How _dare_ you?!" She hissed. "What has Remus ever done to you?!"

Snape stared at her, shock and pain on his face. If Snape hadn't just destroyed his life, Remus would have felt immensely sorry for the other boy.

"You said you were _sorry_. You said you still wanted to be my _friend_," Lily continued, her voice getting louder. "I was right not to trust you. No friend would have ever done this to me."

"Lily," Snape started, sounding almost pitiful. His triumphal moment had quickly morphed into total defeat.

She turned on her heel and knelt down in front of Remus again. Completely ignoring Snape, she began to nurse his injuries again. "Your eye is swelling. Come on, let's find some ice."

Silently, Remus let her pull him to his feet and lead him towards the Leaky Cauldron. He glanced back over his shoulder once more to see Snape staring after them, mortification and loss on his face.

Sirius was nowhere to be seen.


	7. Chapter 7

**Part Seven:**_ In which Lily has a confession and Remus makes his decision_

"Careful!" He yelped, jumping as Lily placed a small handful of ice wrapped in her handkerchief against his cheekbone.

She gave him a look that suggested her patience was strained. "It won't hurt as much if you stay still." She pressed the handkerchief against his face again. "Hold that in place."

He obeyed grudgingly and stared at a spot on the kitchen floor. The chipped tiles stared back. At least his parents were still out. He wasn't sure how he was going to explain his newly-acquired black eye to them. The truth was particularly painful, but he couldn't come up with any decent lies at the moment. Explicit lying had always been difficult for him; his talents in the area had always lain in the lie of omission.

"Remus?" Lily asked, breaking the silence. It took a great effort to pry his eyes away from the floor to look at her. "Are you okay?"

He involuntarily jerked away from her and muttered, "Fine." He didn't miss the hurt that flashed through Lily's eyes and he looked down again. "I can't do this anymore, Lily."

"Please," she said softly, "Can we not talk about this right now?"

"No," he said firmly, looking up at her. "We have to talk about this."

"I know, but I just…I can't handle talking about this right now, Remus. Seeing you and Sirius – and then I struck Sev! I just can't deal with any more." She rested her elbows on the table as she ran her hands over her face. After a moment, she looked back at him, resignation on her face. "Please…can't it wait 'til tomorrow?"

"No." He removed the ice from his eye. "This can't wait. My friends all hate me, Lily." He let the handkerchief full of ice on the kitchen table and heard his voice start to rise. "Peter's been avoiding me all week. I just got into a _fight_ with Sirius. And I can promise you that, as we speak, he's back at the Potters' telling James how I betrayed him."

"You didn't betray James Potter," she told him, sounding annoyed. "I don't belong to him. Just because he's an arrogant bully who claims he finds me attractive doesn't mean he gets to say who I can and cannot spend time with."

With a defeated sigh, Remus gathered his makeshift ice pack and returned it to his eye. "James Potter has been a better friend to me than anyone I've ever known." He heard himself echoing Sirius's words from the other night and knew that they were true. While James was not perfect, he was one of the best people Remus had ever met and one he certainly didn't deserve to have as a friend. "You've just never taken the chance to get to know him. If you had, you'd know he's literally willing to risk his own life for his friends. And he loves you, Lily. He's loved you for years, and he acts like an idiot because he's trying so hard to impress you."

"I'd never go out with him," she insisted. "I don't know how either you or Potter could possibly think he has any claim on me, because, in case you've missed it, Remus Lupin, I'm not in love with James Potter. I'm in love with you."

Time stopped, and Remus realized that he must have died. No, his face was still throbbing. Definitely not dead. Hallucinating then. He stared at her. "Wh-what?"

The stubborn expression on Lily's face melted away, leaving only vulnerability behind. "This summer, while we were pretending…I stopped. I fell in love with you."

At those softly spoken words, his heart soared. He'd always wanted to hear those words directed at him. They were words he'd never expected to hear, never dreamed of coming from the mouth of someone he wanted with every fiber of his being. He'd spent hours upon hours daydreaming of what it would be like to hear Lily Evans say those words to him – to hear she loved him, she wanted him, _she chose him._ And now it was happening. It was actually happening.

And it couldn't.

For all the reasons he'd told Peter, it couldn't. James, who had risked so much for him, was hopelessly in love with her. And even if James wasn't in love with her, it didn't change the fact that werewolves were vicious creatures that needed to avoid romantic entanglements at all costs.

"Remus? Please, say something." Lily was looking up at him, fear in her eyes.

"You don't know what you're saying, Lily." He was tired of lying. He lied to his friends, he lied to his parents, he lied to himself. It was time to stop lying. If she wasn't able to understand the why as it related to James, there was another explanation to give her.

It would only cost him the thing he so desperately wanted.

Remus set down the ice pack and pushed his chair away from the table. His eyes returned to his favorite tiles on the floor. "You don't even know me."

"I know what's important. I know how much you care about your friends and family, and that you'd do anything for them. I know that you constantly compare yourself with Potter and Black and would do practically anything to get people to like you, even though anyone who actually gets to know you would much prefer you when you're just being yourself. I know that you listen when I talk, and when things aren't going so well, you know what to say or do to make me feel better. I know what makes you laugh, and I practically catalogued in my mind all the things I can do to make you smile…"

His head snapped up. "You don't know me," he interrupted her, repeating his earlier phase.

She locked her eyes with his. "I know about the lycanthropy, if that's what you're talking about." Her voice was soft, but firm. "I just wasn't going to include it on the list because it's not important."

"If you believe that," he said quietly, "Then you aren't nearly as intelligent as I always believed you were." But he knew she didn't believe it. It was just the right thing to say. His parents' friends had said similar things before slowly ending those friendships. Remus looked away, unable to meet her eyes. The only real questions left were how long she knew and whether she would share his secret with the world. "Who told you?"

"No one, really. I started to put it together for myself last year when we had prefect duty together. It's not exactly a secret that you're ill, and you always seemed to get sick around full moon." She paused for a moment to take a breath before continuing. "But you confirmed my suspicions unknowingly when we met for lunch at the beginning of the summer. I was telling you about Sev and you said that sometimes friends do really horrible things without thinking. I know you trust Peter explicitly and you're practically willing to die for James Potter, so it had to be Sirius who was the friend who did something really horrible without thinking." She hesitated. "He told Sev your secret, didn't he? The night that James Potter pulled Sev out from under the Willow. And you were the," she faltered.

"The monster in the tunnel," he finished darkly. "Yes." He pulled himself to his feet and walked over to stand in front of the small window above the sink. He wasn't surprised. He knew she would think of him that way. He was used to it.

"You aren't a monster, Remus."

Oh, but he was. And it wasn't just the wolf. There was more than one way to be a monster.

"And it doesn't change how I feel about you," Lily continued.

How she felt about him? It took him a moment to remember how the conversation began, to remember that Lily had claimed to…to love him. He had heard it, hadn't he? He knew she said it; she said she had fallen in love with him. But she hadn't really. She even admitted to knowing what he was. It was one thing to befriend a werewolf, but to love one? In a romantic sense? It was impossible.

"Remus?" Lily's hand brushed against his arm and he realized she was standing behind him.

He turned around and was startled by how close she was. He tried to take a step backwards but found he was pressed against the kitchen counter. "It should affect how you see me. That stuff in the Defense textbooks is true. I'm dangerous. I'd kill my best friend if I saw him when I'm the wolf."

"I know." Lily didn't show any signs of moving away, "I get strong marks in Defense every year."

"You know," he scoffed. "You know. No, you just _think_ you know." He was suddenly snapping at her, and he didn't care. She just _did not understand_. If she did, she wouldn't be standing in his kitchen, spouting absolute nonsense that was nothing more than a mixture of idealistic childish daydreams and blissful ignorance. "Did you know that my father's lost several jobs because his son's a werewolf? Did you know that most of my mother's friends shunned her because of me? Do you know that's how all the people we go to school with will react if they ever learn what I am? Do you know what it's like to wake up bloody and beaten, having no idea how it happened but knowing that you did it to yourself? Do you know what it's like to learn how you almost killed someone by ripping their throat out with your teeth? You don't. You don't know what any of it is like. And you stand there, and you tell me that you _understand_ and that you _don't care_, but if you knew, if you really knew, you'd turn around and run away like everyone else!"

He expected her to slap him the way she had Snape. Part of him wished she'd slap him. If she had any sense at all, she would at least turn on her heel and walk out.

Instead, Lily's eyes flashed. She gave him a measuring look as she crossed her arms against her chest. "You know, I never figured you for a coward."

The slap would have been more compassionate.

He recoiled from her words, the sting hitting him in the chest. "What the hell does that mean!?"

"It means you're scared." She snapped. "You're scared because some ignorant people once told you that you didn't deserve to be loved and you were stupid enough to believe them. You're scared because you don't think you have a right to be happy. And you're scared that someone could feel so deeply for you that they'd gladly shoulder the burden that you _insist_ they can't understand because they'd be happier to face people's ignorance with you than live without you. But what really scares you is that you love me just as much as I love you, and you can't admit it, so you cling to the werewolf-martyr role in hopes of becoming a self-fulfilling prophesy!"

Her words hung in the air. They were true. Deep down, he knew Lily was right. He loved her so much it hurt. It frightened him that he could feel such strong feelings towards another person.

And because he loved her, he would do what was best for her. No matter how much it hurt him to do it. All it took was one more lie, and he'd been lying all summer. Just one more, except this time, it would be for the greater good. It would hurt her at first, but ultimately it would be what was best for her. She'd be happier and much better off without him. She didn't see it now, couldn't understand it now, but one day she'd look back and realize that he did what he was about to do because he cared for her and wanted her to have everything she deserved.

And she deserved far better than him.

Remus gave her a small, sad little smile. "You might love me, but I'm not in love with you."

Lily stepped back as if he'd slapped her, her face going white.

"I'm so sorry, Lily." He practically choked on the lie as he forced it past his teeth. "But there's never been anything more than friendship between us. And there never will be."

She was blinking furiously now, and he knew she was trying desperately to keep from crying in front of him. "Then this summer…?"

"It was just pretend," he said quietly, feeling as if someone had just stabbed him in the gut.

Lily shut her eyes, her hand over her mouth.

The knife twisted. "I'm sorry."

In the front room, the door opened and they could hear his parents' voices as they returned home from whatever outing they'd been on. Lily became even paler and her eyes darted to the doorway between the front room and the kitchen. She looked back at him and mumbled, "I need to go."

"I'll walk you back…" he started.

"No." She held up a hand. "No, Remus, I'll go alone." And before he could respond, she slipped out the back door and was gone.


	8. Chapter 8

**Part Eight:** _In which Lily's opinion of James Potter is proven wrong_

The look Mrs. Potter gave him when he arrived in her fireplace was all he needed to know that Sirius had, indeed, beaten him there and told James everything. Of course, his own parents hadn't helped matters by insisting on hearing the whole story of why he was standing in their kitchen looking like he'd gotten into a nasty fist-fight, which was, unfortunately, exactly what he _had_ done. Sirius had plenty of time to tell the Potters everything.

He wasn't surprised when Mrs. Potter coldly asked him what he wanted, but it still hurt. The shame of what he'd done to people who had never been anything but kind to him flooded over him. He managed to swallow and inquired if he could speak with James. There had been several moments where he was almost positive that she was going to tell him that he most certainly could not and he'd best leave her home immediately, but she surprised him, sending him out into the back yard.

From the porch, he could see James sitting against the base of the large tree they often congregated under, while Sirius was on his feet, his fists clenched, pacing back and forth. Neither boy had noticed his arrival, and Remus almost wished they'd both look over, charge him, and pummel him into the ground. That would be a lot easier than what he was going to have to endure. Slowly, he began the solitary trudge across the backyard.

"I know what I saw!" Sirius suddenly exclaimed.

"No, you _think_ you know what you saw!" A female voice shouted back at him.

Remus froze. It was Lily's. What was Lily doing here?

"If you'd just _listen_ for once in your life, I'm trying to tell you what happened! It's _my_ fault! Don't you get it, you stupid oaf?" Lily suddenly appeared from behind the tree trunk, poking a finger against Sirius's chest. "I set the whole thing up!"

"Yeah, sure, a joke on Snape," Sirius spat. "That's a nice little story. Of course, only an idiot would believe it."

"Remus believed it," Lily told him furiously. "It was the only thing I could think of. I knew he'd never intentionally do anything to hurt the rest of your little gang, though why I have no idea, since at the first test you were all willing to believe the worst in him." She suddenly stopped cold, her mouth open, distress on her face. She had noticed him.

James and Sirius both whipped their heads around to see what she was staring at. Sirius recovered first. "Oh, he has a lot of nerve…" he muttered, clenching his fists again and storming across the yard.

Remus didn't move. He knew what was coming. He wasn't going to fight it. He _had_ betrayed James. Sirius had warned him, and Sirius had made it quite clear that things were not over in Diagon Alley when his relatives had intervened.

"Sirius, wait!" James jumped to his feet and grabbed his best friend's shoulder. "Just…wait." He said something softly to Sirius that Remus couldn't catch, then moved away from the group on his own.

Well, at least James slugging him seemed more appropriate than Sirius doing it. After all, James was the one he'd actually wronged. Remus felt his body tense in anticipation.

The punch never came. Instead, James stopped in front of him, his eyes filled with hurt, confusion, and anger. Through clenched teeth, he asked the hardest question Remus had ever heard. "Is it true?"

He'd promised not to lie. Of everyone involved, James deserved the truth. All of it. That included the details of his treachery - the deliberate choices he'd made, as horrible as they were. Remus looked at his feet. "You might want to sit down for this."

James glanced back over his shoulder. Sirius had returned to pacing under the tree, silently fuming. Lily, meanwhile, had taken James's prior seat, leaning back against the tree and staring up into the branches, a miserable expression on her face. He looked back at Remus. "It's a yes or no question, Moony. Either you did or you didn't."

"I know. But there's more to it than yes or no, and I don't know if Sirius even knows everything…" He continued to examine the ground as if it was the most fascinating thing he'd ever seen. James wasn't asking him for all the details, all the rationalizations. James was asking him whether he'd gotten involved with Lily, and it was very much a yes or no question. Stalling or trying to make it seem like he'd done nothing wrong wasn't fair to his friend. He'd asked, and Remus had promised himself that he would answer. Taking a deep breath, he looked up and admitted, "I did the most horrible thing I could ever do to you. I didn't mean for it to happen, but it did, and I'm so sorry, James. You have every reason to hate me."

James looked away, his expression suggesting that he was playing the words over in his mind. He nodded slightly to himself, making some sort of internal decision, then looked back at Remus. "I know Padfoot's side of the story, and I think I know Evans's." He sighed. "I should probably hear yours. You at least deserve a chance to tell it."

He deserved nothing of the sort. What he deserved was to have James order him out of his home and with instructions never to return. But instead, James was once again being better to him than he could ever imagine. "Really?"

"You heard Padfoot out when he sent Snape down that tunnel after you." James fell, defeated, on yet another of the Potters' carved garden benches. "I reckon I can show you the same courtesy."

Bracing himself, Remus took a deep breath and started at the beginning. He told of meeting Lily in London for lunch and her request for a fake boyfriend. He admitted to confiding the secret in Peter but not James or Sirius, and told how Peter had been sworn to secrecy. He talked of running into Snape at the funfair, and Lily's admission as to what was occurring in Slytherin House while they hid in the fortune-teller's tent. He told of the afternoons spent doing homework at Lily's home or in the park, and the time Lily had kissed him as he left. He explained how Peter was horrified when he learned what Remus had done. He ended with what occurred earlier that day in Diagon Alley, and then in his kitchen. Forty minutes after he started, he fell silent.

James said nothing at first. He stared at the birdbath in the middle of his mother's flowers, a blank expression on his face. Finally, he blinked and looked up. "I'm going to be honest with you, Remus." The words sounded heavy, as if it was hard to say them. "Out of all my friends, you're the last person I would ever have picked as the one to betray my trust. I trusted you with things that I couldn't trust Sirius with, or Peter, or anyone. And you know what it's like to when someone abuses that trust, more than any of us."

"I'm sorry."

"I know," James told him. "I know you're sorry, but that doesn't fix things. It's not that you agreed to Evans's scheme, and it's not that you initially told Peter but didn't tell me or Sirius. I get why you did that. That I can forgive. But when I asked you – point blank – about Evans earlier this week, you lied to me like it was the easiest thing in the world." He sighed. "I don't know if we'll ever get that trust back again. I just don't know. But I know right now that I don't trust you anymore. Not the way I used to."

That was fair. And he knew that James was right, they'd never get that trust back. "I'm sorry."

"Moony, I know you're sorry." James shook his head. "I know you feel awful about everything. You know you were a complete prat. I know you were a complete prat." He paused before adding the words he knew Remus needed to hear, "I don't hate you. We're still friends."

Remus took his turn at staring at the birdbath. "I don't know how you can say that."

"I know you don't." He sighed. "But friends, well, a real friend knows the worst things about you but still chooses to stick by you anyway. Everything isn't okay, but, well, we'll get through this. We've gotten through worse."

Remus nodded dumbly, knowing he'd never done anything to deserve a friend like James Potter. Why, he wondered, did James insist on putting up with him? "Thank you."

"Honestly, Moony, you don't thank someone for being your friend." With a slightly wry look, James shook his head. Becoming serious again, he took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "I don't know why I'm telling you this, Moony, but I think you have a right to know." He took another deep breath. "Evans manipulated you into this. She told me and Padfoot how she's fancied you since fall term and she came up with this fake relationship thing in hopes that you'd fall for her. She even knew what buttons to push to make you agree to it. You probably never had much of a chance. It doesn't change the fact that you lied to me, but…maybe I can understand how you got in over your head to begin with."

Remus stared at him. "I don't believe it." Lily didn't have a manipulative bone in her body. Why would she make something like that up? Why would she tell James that she'd done something like that, when she never could have brought herself to even consider it?

"She confessed everything to us before you got here," James told him. "Kept insisting that everything was really her fault."

_Oh, Lily. You shouldn't have._ He wasn't quite sure why, but _she_ was trying to protect _him._ Something constricted inside his chest and he had to look away again.

"Look, Moony," James was talking again. "She fancies you. You feel something for her. If you want her," he hesitated, "If you want her, I'll step aside."

Remus stared at him. He'd snuck around with the girl James fancied, lied to James's face about it, got caught…and now James was offering to remove any obstacles so that the girl he liked could waltz off into the sunset with his friend. Remus shut his eyes, knowing how easy it would be to confess that he was, indeed, in love with Lily Evans. How easy it would be to take James's words as a blessing and beg Lily to take him back. But at the end of the day, he was still a werewolf.

And he wasn't going to let James do this. This was too much.

"I don't love her, Prongs. I think I was in love with the idea that someone could feel something romantic towards me." Remus heard himself saying the words, but they sounded so far away, as if there was a wall in between him and them. "I wanted to know what it felt like to have a girl think of me that way. That's all."

"Well, if you change your mind, I don't think I'm going to pursue her anymore," James remarked. There was something in his expression that said he still cared for Lily, but she'd fallen from the pedestal. She wasn't the perfect goddess he'd always envisioned her to be. Somehow, in that moment, Remus knew that James would back off, but, in doing so, he'd get the girl. He'd be himself around Lily and once Lily saw the real James, she'd fall head over heels for him. They'd be the ones waltzing off into the sunset together.

It was what was right.

With another sigh, James got to his feet. "Look, why don't you head home. I'll come over tomorrow and we can talk – you, me, Wormtail, and Padfoot, just like we did after the Willow. That'll give me a chance to get Padfoot calmed down."

Remus didn't trust himself to say anymore, so he just nodded.

"And take Evans home, will you? I think this whole thing's been as rough on her as it was on all of us." James clapped him once on the shoulder before returning to the group under the tree. After a few minutes of quiet conversation, Lily climbed to her feet and started towards him. She swiped at her eyes once before joining him.

"Lily…"

"Don't, Remus." She held up a hand. "I don't want to talk right now. Potter said you'd take me home, but I can get there on my own."

He understood. If their positions were reversed, he'd feel the same way. "Alright." He watched her for a moment, trying to come to terms with how she'd thrown herself on her sword to protect him. After what he'd said to her, what he'd done to her…she still tried to help him. "Lily? Why?" It slipped out of his mouth before he could stop it.

She gave him a small smile. "You know why." Before he could respond, Lily turned and started back towards the Potters' home.

He knew he could call after her. He could chase her down and tell her that he really did love her, and he knew that if he did, she'd forgive him, she'd still take him back. He knew that all it would take was one word.

But she deserved so much more than a cowardly werewolf, so he let her go.


	9. Chapter 9

**Epilogue:**_ In which Remus comes to his senses and gets it right_

Her mother had always warned her not to act purely on her emotions. Hell, she could still hear her mother's voice lecturing her: "It will only get you in trouble, Nymphadora. You have a good head on your shoulders if you would only _use_ it." She'd often told her mother she used her head just fine – after all, you had to be smart to be an Auror. Deep down, though, she knew that her mother was right.

She was definitely right in _this_ instance.

Her head, had she listened to it, would have kept her out of the current situation. She wouldn't have made a scene in the hospital wing while standing with Remus Lupin beside Bill's bedside, she wouldn't have confessed her undying love in front of everyone, she wouldn't have stormed out in total humiliation…. And she definitely wouldn't be sitting beside the lake listening to the same Remus Lupin tell her a story about how he was still hopelessly in love with his dead best friend's wife!

Tonks wrapped her arms around her knees angrily and stared out at the dark water. A simple "I just don't love you" would have been enough. She would have backed off if he'd said that. She only kept pursuing him because she thought, well, she thought he was just being a noble prat, trying to protect her from something even though she damn well didn't need or want protecting. But all that "protecting" talk was just, well, protecting her from the truth.

She was really starting to hate protecting.

"You know, Remus, if you weren't interested, you could just bloody well have told me _that_," she managed to get out between clenched teeth at the conclusion to his tale. "It would have been less painful than being led on with the whole 'I care for you but I'm not good enough for you' routine and it definitely wouldn't have hurt anywhere near as much as the 'I'm still in love with James Potter's wife' speech you've just given me." Why had he even _thought_ that would comforting?! Oh, yes, finding out the man she was in love with was carrying a torch for a woman who had been dead for fifteen years made things _so much better_.

Beside her, Remus – no, not Remus, Lupin; it would be easier if she didn't think of him as Remus – Lupin rubbed his hands over his face and sighed. "I'm not in love with Lily Potter. I haven't been for a long time."

"Right. And the purpose of that story was what? To let me know you have a history of running away when women tell you they love you? Gee, Remus, that makes me feel _great!_" She wished Sirius were here. Sirius would at least have slapped Lupin upside the head and told him to stop being an idiot, and, deep down, she liked to think that Sirius would take her side if his friend hurt her. After all, she was one of his only decent relatives…. Tonks pushed herself to her feet.

"Where are you going?" Lupin now sounded confused.

She ignored him. It was none of his damn business and she wanted to nurse what was left of her pride in peace. Somehow he'd missed that glaringly obvious fact when he'd come over for story time an hour ago.

"Tonks…." He called after her.

Don't turn around. Just keep walking. She was done with that man. Done, done, done, done, done. She'd wasted too much time and energy on him. She'd let him hurt her over and over again, and she wasn't going to do it anymore.

He didn't want her. He'd never wanted her. She'd damn well known it for the better part of a year and had been deluding herself. Well, not anymore. She was better than that. If he didn't see it, it was his damn loss…

"Nymphadora, wait!"

She turned around and noticed he'd stood up, too. She opened her mouth to tell him not to call her that. She wanted to point her wand at him and threaten to hex him into the next millennium for hurting her like he did tonight…. She couldn't find the strength to do any of it. Instead, she let her arms drop to her sides, feeling utterly defeated. "What?"

"I, look, I'm not very good with, well, romantic stuff."

She snorted. That was the understatement of the decade. Hell, it was like Snape saying 'I'm not very good with shampoo.'

"I never told anyone that story before," Lupin continued.

Tonks held up a hand. "Is there a _point_ to all this? Because if there is, can't you just make it and let me go sulk in peace?" She briefly wondered why was she being so ridiculous. A man had _died_ tonight and here she was getting all worked up because Remus bloody Lupin didn't want to whisk her off into the sunset. What kind of person did that? She should feel ashamed of herself….

"I-made-a-mistake-before-and-I-don't-want-to-make-the-same-mistake-twice," Lupin said, the words coming out quick and jumbled as he interrupted her thoughts.

She just stared at him. There was only one good reason to explain what had just been said – clearly, she must have heard him wrong. "What?"

"I told you the story," he explained, slower this time, "Because I was trying to, well, to tell you that I made a mistake with Lily, and after you stormed out of the hospital wing, I realized I was making the same mistake with you." He paused, obviously at conflict with himself. Brutal honesty appeared to win, because he quietly added, "Only worse, because Lily was a teenage infatuation, and you're…you're…you're the real thing."

Her heart jumped up into her throat and she felt her wand fall from her hand.

Remus took a deep breath and walked over to her. He stopped within centimeters of her, close enough that if she moved forward at all, she'd touch him, and looked down at his worn shoes for several moments before meeting her eyes. "Nymphadora, I don't want to make that mistake with you."

She blinked several times as the meaning set in. Everything inside of her screamed to throw her arms around him, to kiss him full on the mouth, and then to ask him why he had felt the need to be such a bloody idiot for such a long time. But she'd already let her emotions dictate her actions and maybe it was time to try some of her mother's advice and at least _attempt_ to restrain herself. Taking a deep breath of her own, she looked up at him. "Remus?"

"Yes?" His voice was soft.

She rose up on her toes, leaned forward, and whispered, "Don't call me…" She never had a chance to finish, as his mouth closed over hers. Tonks leaned against him, wrapping her arms around his neck as he pulled her against him. As her head started swimming, the last thing she remembered thinking before letting Remus Lupin completely whisk her off her feet was that her mother was definitely wrong about that whole emotions thing.

~*~

finis.


End file.
